Emma Lo

Customer Success & RevOps Leader | Podcast host of CS In Focus | Help businesses accelerate in customer-led growth

Results-driven Customer Success executive and SaaS startup founder with 13+ years of experience in tech and e-commerce. Passionate about leveraging data-driven strategies to boost customer satisfaction, retention, and revenue growth.

💼 Career Highlights:

- Founded and scaled customer success teams, increasing NPS from 79% to 89%
- Drove $35M+ in revenue, achieving 40% increase in retention
- Built and led high-performing remote teams across customer success, marketing, and operations
- Developed strategies resulting in $7MM ARR from enterprise B2B accounts
- Maintained 119% Net Revenue Retention with zero logo churn

🚀 Expertise:

- Customer Success Strategy & Operations
- Revenue Growth & Retention Optimization
- SaaS Startup Leadership & Scaling
- Cross-functional Team Management
- Data-Driven Decision Making


🔧 Tech Stack:

ChurnZero, Gong, Salesforce, Zendesk, HubSpot, Atlassian, and more

Combining a unique background in healthcare research with tech leadership, I bring an analytical approach to solving complex business challenges. 

--------------

🤝 Let's connect if you're interested in:

- Customer-centric growth strategies
- SaaS scaling and operations
- Revenue optimization in tech startups

Always open to discussing new opportunities and sharing insights on customer success and revenue growth in the tech industry.

#CustomerSuccess #SaaS #RevenueGrowth #StartupLeadership

Manager, Customer Success

- Organize Quarterly Customer Advisory Board
- Implement digital customer success strategies to provide scalable support.
- Utilize data analytics to understand customer behaviour and needs.
- Ensure effective onboarding and adoption of Noibu's platform by customers.
- Proactively identify risks and reduce churn.
- Enhance customer satisfaction and retention through targeted digital interactions.

Emma Lo 🧩

My first Thanksgiving memory is not the turkey. 🦃

It is a teacher.



I was 5.
New to New Jersey.
New to English.

Mrs. Johnson asked us to cut out paper turkeys.
She talked about harvest and pilgrims.


A local newspaper came that day.

They took a picture of me dressed as a pilgrim,
sitting at a tiny table, eating pumpkin pie.

I do not remember how the pie tasted.
I remember her kindness.


After school, she would sit with me one on one.

Point to an apple.
Say “Apple.” 🍎
Wait for me to repeat it back.

Day after day, she gave me something my grades could not show yet.

Belonging.

——————————-


Life moved on.

I grew up, built a career, moved countries.

But I never forgot her.


Years later, as an adult, I wrote a letter to thank her.

The school forwarded it to her family. 

A few weeks later, a reply arrived from her retirement home in Florida. 

She still remembered me.
Almost 40 years later.

——————————-

When people talk about opportunity, this is who I think of.

Yes, my parents worked hard.
Yes, I worked hard.


But before all of that, there was a teacher who made room for a quiet five-year-old immigrant at the table.

Who slowed down.

Who showed me, in a new country, that I was not an outsider.



This Thanksgiving, I am grateful for the Mrs. Johnsons of the world.

The people who:

→ Explain the simple things without making you feel small

→ Notice who is struggling and stay a little longer

→ Remember you, even decades later



If someone did that for you, this is your reminder.

Write the letter.

Send the message.

Say thank you while you still can.


#thankful #gratitude 

P.S. do you still remember the cords  📞

Emma Lo🧋

CS & RevOps Leader | Driving Scalable Customer-Led Growth Across GTM | Top 100 CS Strategist 2025 & CS In Focus Podcast and Owner

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Meet James Alarcon 


We first met at the ChurnZero event 

Since then, he has been the friend who checks in, calls when you are in town, and makes time to connect.

I watched him move from team lead to director. 

He built with what he had.

Tested, iterated, and defended his team when it mattered.


Everyone can talk strategy.

Few can influence a vision and get people aligned.

Even fewer roll up their sleeves and do the hard work. 💪


Now he is in a new role, with his playbook tested and the land mapped.

He is hiring for CSMs🔥


If you want to work for a leader who grows both people and revenue, talk to James Alarcon. 

#hiring #gta #customersuccess

Took my kids to see Wicked 2 this weekend.

I walked out thinking about all the themes

Living in a bubble.
No place like home.
Finding something worth fighting for.


My kids? 

Flying monkeys.
A green girl finally learning to use her powers.
And a lot of very loud singing. 🙉

P.S. Have you seen the movie?

AI in CS is stuck in the messy middle. 


At NY Success Week, I asked Brent Grimes from Reef.ai a simple question:
Where are GTM teams really with AI adoption?

His answer: 
Plenty of AI projects.
Very few signals strong enough to change a forecast, renewal plan, or board slide.

For GTM orgs, that is the real execution gap
→ Fewer signals, higher conviction.


What we should look into with AI: 

1️⃣  Revenue signal

Churn, down sell, and expansion probabilities 6 to 12 months out 
that influence your commit, not just a health score.


2️⃣ Value signal

Proof that customers are achieving outcomes 
that tie directly to renewal and expansion, not just logins or activity.

3️⃣ Coverage signal

Clear visibility into which champions, buyers, and users are engaged with those outcomes, and how recently.


If AI cannot help you see risk and expansion early enough to change the number, it stays in the experiment bucket.

Are you growning in dashboards and still guessing on renewals?

#reef #ai #GTM #renewals #cs

What happens when Tamagotchi grows wheels and runs on GPT?



As a kid, my “robot” was a Tamagotchi. 🐣

A few pixels on a keychain, and you had to remember to feed it.


Now we have Loona. 🐶 

A robot pet that follows your kid, remembers their face, reacts to emotions, chats with GPT, and helps with homework.


Cool, yes.

However, it subtly changes the meanings of “friend,” “play,” and “help.”


I’m excited about robots like Loona in kids’ lives. 

I’m just not sure I want them replacing relationships and learning. 

P.S. Would you let your kid have a GPT robot best friend?

The truth behind “healthy” accounts that still churn


Your post-sales pipeline is not a calendar.
It is proof that you are solving real business problems.

On CS in Focus Live, Roland Griesmayer and Anthony DeShazor said the quiet part out loud about forecasting:


Money follows problems.
Predictability follows clarity.


Roland’s bar for a real deal was simple:

If a rep cannot clearly explain the business issue the customer is paying to fix, the deal is not predictable.

“Making someone’s job easier” is not a business issue.
“More intuitive” is not a business issue.

You need answers like:

This fixes X.
This prevents Y.
This unlocks Z in revenue or removes Z in cost.


Anthony pushed the harder truth. 

Most teams don’t fail at delivering value.
They fail at telling the story of that value in a way a CFO will repeat in a budget meeting.

With just over five weeks left in Q4, post-sales pipeline reviews need to tighten up:

1/ Start with the business problem

For every renewal and expansion, ask:
What problem did we solve and how does the customer describe it?


2/ Tie the forecast to a real sponsor

Has the person with budget and authority engaged on that problem in the last 90 days?


3/ Require a written value story

One short paragraph per account: problem, impact, and why it matters now.

If your CSM cannot write it, you cannot forecast it.


4/ Use signals, not sentiment

Swap “they love us” for proof: outcomes achieved, milestones completed, risk removed, executive alignment.

5/ End every review with ownership

Each renewal and expansion needs an owner, a next action, and a date.
No “we will keep an eye on it.”

-------------------
That was the through line from the live:

Real problems make deals real.
Clear stories make revenue predictable.

P.S. What's your non-negotiable when reviewing a deal? 

#gtm #pipeline review

Forecast this in 30 seconds. 


DAUs are up 18%.
Your champion just left.
Procurement took control.
A second product POC is live.

What’s your renewal probability now...and why?


Most teams default to pipeline. 

However, operators weigh three things first: 
relationship health, user outcomes, buyer control. 

Which one would change your forecast today?

-------------------------

This Friday Eleanor (Ella) Eng and I will interview Anthony DeShazor and Roland Griesmayer on how they build forecasts that survive board inspection. 

We’ll dig into signals, weights, and the inspection cadence that keeps accuracy high.

Join us on CS in Focus LinkedIn Live

📆 Friday, Nov 21 · 12:00–12:45 ET

🔗 https://lnkd.in/gthvhXX5

P.S. What’s your non-negotiable metric in a 2026 forecast, and why?

#gtm #forecast #linkedinlive #cs

Feeling overwhelmed by Black Friday deals?

Same.


Yesterday, I was browsing the Apple website like a lost child in a corn maze.

So many models. So many chips. So many display options.

And then I met Cierra over the phone.

The best Apple Sales Rep a confused customer could ask for.



I told her all my fears:

What if I pick the wrong chip?
What if I regret the memory?
What if I’m stuck with a machine that hates me by January?

She didn’t rush me.
She didn’t push a promo.

She listened.
She broke down the decision.
She made sense of my chaos.

With the kind of calm only seasoned retail heroes have during BFCM.

But the part that stayed with me?

She shared my excitement.

I told her I’m starting a new chapter. A new season of life. 

She lit up and cheered me on like I was Dorothy stepping onto the yellow brick road, with a brand-new MacBook and ready to click my red heels. 👠 

Somewhere in that call, I realized something simple:

You don’t need the most expensive laptop to get the best outcome.
You need the one that actually fits your work, your life, and your next chapter.


It reminded me that good customer service isn’t about the product.

It’s about the person who helps you believe you’re making the right choice.


Cheers to you, Cierra. 🎩 

You turned Black Friday chaos into a little moment of courage.
And I’m grateful for it.

#blackfriday #apple 

P.S. The best email I got from BFCM.

Revenue Retention Advisors LLC

New sales are costly and unpredictable.  It's more important than ever to retain the revenue you have and achieve growth through your existing customer base.

We help companies reduce the cost of customer acquisition, increase customer lifetime value and accelerate revenue retention and growth.

We offer a complimentary consultation, so let's exploring how we can help you achieve your revenue retention goals.

Growth Executive

AppEQ.ai

AppEQ is an in-app, account 360 system that improves data visibility and deep collaboration for Sales, Marketing, Success, and Support teams through account-based conversations and AI bots. It increases the productivity of customer-facing teams and promotes seamless, cross-departmental alignment for accelerated growth.  Check it out https://www.appeq.ai/view-demo!

Advisor

Syncly (YC W23)

Syncly uses AI to help RevOps and customer success team to better understand customer needs. Backed by Y Combinator, SoftBank, and 500 Global.

Oracle

Harnessed the voice of customers and partners to accelerate value realization and foster loyalty. Provided actionable insights for stakeholders (across Product, Engineering, Sales, and beyond) to maximize revenue through adoption and prioritize product opportunities.  Drive customer retention and advocacy by strengthening value delivery, empathetic partnership and responsive support.

• Increased correlated annual cloud revenue by 63% for Customer Advisory Board members, 154% for Partner Advisory Board members from FY’21 to FY’23. 
• Grew advisory board membership by 40% and delivered impactful product insights to Product and Engineering and Sales organizations.

Global Lead, Cloud Customer Insights, Executive Engagement and Success

We help startups scale with Oracle. Oracle for Startups is an accelerator but better: deep discounts and coaching across business pillars without having to give up any equity! I connect the dots between startups and Oracle Cloud in the greater San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. 

• Reduced friction for individual startup companies to connect with the Oracle resources by understanding their business objectives and coaching on best practices.
• Collaborated with cross-functional leaders on engagement models and strategies to help the startups in our program to accelerate value realization.

Oracle for Startup Ambassador

Working with global customers to support their marketing maturity journey and crushing their business goals.  Providing thought leadership, marketing/product strategies and best practices as well as consulting on cross-functional alignment and collaboration. 
• Establish true partnership and trust with the top 5% global customers to drive retention and growth of $10M+ in ARR.
• Strengthened 2-5% key KPIs with executive leadership, technology innovation and marketing strategy

Global Director, Product Strategy and Success

Lead the global Customer Insights and Strategy team for Oracle's CX Marketing.  I evangelize our vision and strategy with customers worldwide and provide guidance on improving their strategies for acquisition, expansion, retention/loyalty and getting the most value from their investments with Oracle.

Global Lead for Customer Strategy, CX Marketing

As the global lead for customer retention initiatives for Oracle's Social Cloud product development team, my goal is to inspire my team to collaborate, innovate and deliver a great product that simplifies the work of our customers.

Principal Product Strategy Manager, Oracle Social Cloud

Increase Oracle Social's revenue by developing and managing programs that create happy and loyal customers.

Customer Program Manager

Cisco Systems

Developed and implemented high impact strategic initiatives focused on cross-functional business operations for Cisco's Shared Services Organization.

Recognized by the Engineering Talent team with a CAP Award for leadership in the Women in Technology Forum 2013.

Business Operations Manager, Ops Excellence PMO

Drove alignment of Cisco/WebEx’s New Product Introduction processes for SaaS and premise-based collaboration solutions with Cisco’s standards while managing timelines and deliverables.

Sales Program Manager - Field Readiness

Transformed partner sales training from transactional to consultative approach; strengthening relationships with 3,000 advanced technology and high level global systems integrators, resellers, and service providers selling Cisco/WebEx online conferencing and instant messaging solutions in North America, Asia, and Europe, including:
• Verizon • AT&T  • InterCall • Bell Canada •  Nexus • British Telecom • Premier Global • Data Dimensions • Telstra • Global Crossing

Partner Sales Training Manager

Webex

Account Executive

My mission is to deeply understand your customers, the value that they seek and how your products can deliver the outcomes they want.  

Companies should consider their customers as one of their best growth levers.  It costs 5x less to sell to an existing customer base, than getting a brand new customer/logo.  I left the corporate world to help companies:

- capture the hidden revenue from their existing customer base
- align the cross-functional teams on their go-to-market
- scale the post sales motion to drive growth and profitability

A little bit more about me..

I am the happiest when I'm learning and progressing.  This core value came from my mom, along with grittiness and perseverance, which served us well as an immigrant family from Taiwan.  Fun fact, I think of the multiplication table in Mandarin, because that's how I learn it as a kid.

This love of learning has driven me to let my curiosity guide my career.  Over the last 20+ years, I've led initiatives and teams for global companies including Oracle, Cisco, WebEx and PricewaterhouseCoopers.  I've developed cross-functional expertise in marketing, sales, product, professional services and customer success. The common thread in my career has been my focus on the customers.  That's why I've decided to make it my mission to help companies be more effective at driving customer-led growth and optimizing their post-sales strategy.

👋 If you’re a Founder, CEO, CRO or CFO who needs help with driving growth from your *existing* customers, here’s how I can help:

🚩Let me invest in YOU with a strategy call - click the “Let’s Collaborate!” link in my profile.

🤝 Follow me for more on customer-led revenue growth, post-sales strategies to drive customer retention, product adoption and customer advocacy. 

Learn more at www.revenueretention.net

Sandy Yu

Most companies don’t struggle because they lack data, tools, or talent.

They struggle because their go-to-market lacks clarity and alignment.

That became clear within minutes of beginning our NYC Fix Your Revenue Leaks GTM workshop last Thursday.

When I asked each leader to articulate their biggest GTM challenge, the patterns surfaced quickly:

“We have revenue… but we still haven’t found the language of the market.”
 (Founder, early-stage SaaS)

“Outbound works in the UK.  The same motion falls flat in the U.S.”
(BD leader navigating a cross-continental GTM shift)

“Marketing says one thing, Sales another, CS something else.”
(CS executive turned founder)

“Every rep uses the tech stack differently — it’s chaos.”
(Director of Sales, 60+ sellers)

Individually, these sound like functional problems.  Collectively, they reveal a strategic truth. The organization isn’t misfiring. The organization is misaligned.

- Different narratives.
- Different handoffs.
- Different interpretations of value.
- Different motions by region, segment, and team.

This is what erodes sales velocity, confuses customers, and quietly inflates churn.

So we did the work.
We walked through the 8 pillars of the GTM Partners Operating System (GTM OS), used the framework that cuts across Marketing, Sales, CS, Product, and RevOp to unify:
- ICP & segmentation
- value narrative & POV
- sales execution
- customer expansion
- retention levers 
- data, systems & operating cadence

The shift in the room was immediate. Not because the framework was new.
But because it finally gave every leader a shared language for diagnosing and fixing revenue leaks.

One attendee summed it up perfectly:
“I’ve never seen a unified customer experience across GTM…and that’s why we’re losing momentum.”

Boom! Exactly.

GTM is not a departmental function. It is an organizational system.
When leaders see that, truly see it, the entire business accelerates.

Couldn’t have asked for a better partner than Ben C. at Justworks for hosting the workshop in their beautiful office in NYC. Grateful for the opportunity to co-lead this workshop with CRO Marc Sabatini.  Privileged to have in the workshop Shareth Ben, Joshua Brandt-Rauf, Eleanor (Ella) Eng, Melissa F., Brett House, Daniel Kowal, Mesha Wright, Gavriel Meir-Levi, Elio Narciso, Mesha Wright, Buda Yao thank you all for being part of this unique workshop. 

Next Stop: London, England, at the Snowflake's office, 27 Jan from 2-4:30pm GMT
I'm thrilled to partner with Dora K. to host this private, executive-level Fix Your Revenue Leaks GTM workshop, designed for leaders responsible for growth across the full customer lifecycle and an unique opportunity to tackle their biggest GTM problem. If you’d like to join or nominate a peer, DM me for details.  See you in London in 2026!

I help Chief Revenue Officers (CROs) fix the hidden revenue leaks, keep their customers, and get them to buy more. My three be’s are: be kind, be curious, be a good human.

Margot doesn’t say a word during our workouts. 

But she pushes me harder than any coach ever could.

It’s Friday, I’m wiped from the week, and the only thing that got me to the 7 a.m. class was squeezing ROI from my membership. 🤣 

Then I got paired with Margot - normally a 5 a.m.-er.

She doesn’t talk about effort. She shows it:
- Heavier after every set
- One extra rep after the bell
- “Hard” is the starting point

Watching her made me ask: Am I lifting as heavy as I can? Can I do one more rep? Should I jump instead of step?

Training with Margot raises my effort and erases beliefs like “it’s heavy enough” or “I can’t make that jump.” We all need someone who leads by example—in sport, at work, and at home.

Do you have a Margot? Grateful I have mine.

“You don't need to build pyramids.
But you do need to build.

Every framework you document.
Every story you share.
Every piece of wisdom you publish.

These become your artifacts.
Your foundation.
Your legacy.”

Wise words from Chris Do about building a personal brand. I think it applies well to how we can build the life that we want. 

I’m building a GTM advisory and consulting business to help B2B SaaS organizations tackle revenue leaks that erodes growth.  I’m building it by running my Fix Your Revenue Leaks workshops for CxOs and GTM executives around the world.  

Next stop is in Sydney on Dec 8 and Melbourne on Dec 10.  If you are leading GTM (Sales/Marketing/Sales executives) and would like to tackle your toughest GTM challenges including velocity, churn, lack of alignment, comment “GTM” below and I’ll send you more info.

Have you visited the Pyramids of Kukulcán?

I’ll teach you to charge so much it makes your mom nervous. Hard truths gently told. Build authority through thought leadership → Content Lab.

Standing at the base of the Pyramid of Kukulcán at Chichén Itzá, I'm struck by something most tourists miss.

It's not the pyramid you can see.
It's the foundation you can't.

The Mayans didn't just build upward. They terraformed entire landscapes, leveling massive areas to create perfectly flat foundations. The visible pyramid? That's just the tip. The real work—the unglamorous, backbreaking, invisible work—happened underneath.

A thousand years later, their descendants benefit from that foundation work. Tourism dollars. Cultural pride. A Wonder of the World designation in 2007.

Their ancestors built something that still feeds families today. People travel far and wide just to stand in awe of what was built.

Which brings me to you.

What are you building that no one sees yet?
What foundation are you laying today that your future self will thank you for?

You don't need to build pyramids.
But you do need to build.

Every framework you document.
Every story you share.
Every piece of wisdom you publish.

These become your artifacts.
Your foundation.
Your legacy.

Personal branding isn't about follower counts or coaching funnels. It's about consistently laying down knowledge that makes someone else's journey less difficult.

Do this long enough, and you're not just building content.
You're building something that matters.

Something that lasts.
Something that serves people you'll never meet.

The Mayans built with stone.
You build with stories, lessons and frameworks.

The pyramid? It’s the exciting stuff that gets noticed. (You need this too).

It can last a thousand years if you do the foundation right.

What invisible foundation are you building today that will still matter in 10, or 100 years?

What are you building on top of that foundation?

#personalbranding #legacy #contentcreation

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