Why promote referrals during trial

#354 | Sue (Head of Lifecycle Marketing, Monarch Money), Jonathan (VP of Marketing, Seamless.AI), and Naomi (Senior Product Marketing Manager, Customer.io) join Dan for a live Exit Five session on customer marketing. Sue breaks down how Monarch discovered that the best time to promote their referral program was during trial and the data behind a 64% lift in referral shares and half a million dollars in incremental ARR. Jonathan shares how Seamless.AI stopped treating customer engagement like a campaign and built a full 365-day behavioral program, including an AI chatbot that deflected 55% of support tickets and live trainings that flattened their churn curve. Then Naomi walks through how she uses plain-text emails asking for replies to close the feedback loop on new features and shape the product roadmap.

Timestamps

• (00:00) - - Intro
• (07:15) - - Sue: Why the best time to promote a referral program is during trial, not after
• (10:15) - - The results: 64% lift in referral shares and $500K in incremental ARR
• (17:15) - - Sue's background: 16 years in lifecycle marketing from online dating to Calm to Monarch
• (20:15) - - Jonathan: Stopping treating customer engagement like a campaign
• (26:15) - - Building a 365-day behavioral multi-channel customer engagement program
• (27:15) - - The AI chatbot that deflected 55% of support tickets
• (35:20) - - Live customer training 4x a week and how it flattened the churn curve
• (40:20) - - Growth plays for NRR: marketing to users inside existing accounts
• (42:20) - - Jonathan's results: 24% decrease in cancellations year over year
• (43:20) - - Naomi: Using lifecycle marketing to close the product feedback loop
• (49:20) - - The MCP server onboarding flow and why she asks for replies instead of clicks
• (56:20) - - Using beta email campaigns to shape the product roadmap
• (59:20) - - Live Q&A

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