What to Expect From a Squarespace Enterprise Account Manager
All Squarespace Enterprise customers have a dedicated account manager who provides custom support. An experienced account manager shares how this relationship can maximize your Squarespace success.
Elyse Schaefer prides herself on building an honest and personal working relationship with every Squarespace Enterprise customer she works with. The senior account manager and nine-year Squarespace employee is a strategist, problem solver, and advocate for all of her customers, demonstrating that account managers are a key resource.
Like her colleagues on the Squarespace Enterprise account management team, Elyse feels personally invested in her customers’ success with the platform and works to help them achieve desired results. Through custom onboarding meetings, frequent email check-ins, and personalized messages about new features, she’s frequently connecting with her clients and ensuring they feel comfortable approaching her with feedback.
“Always be honest when you’re talking with your account manager,” Elyse says. “We appreciate constructive criticism and use it to improve the product as a whole.”
The initial onboarding meeting with your Squarespace Enterprise account manager
Your customer onboarding meeting, or initial meeting with your account manager, is the opportune time to set the tone of the working relationship. Elyse recommends setting aside 30 minutes for the meeting to share what you’re hoping to achieve in moving to Squarespace Enterprise.
Account managers lead the conversation with some guided questions, and Elyse reports her most productive conversations happen when her customers are candid with their answers.
“When I meet with customers for the first time, I try to learn why they chose Squarespace and what their website goals are,” she explains. “I also try to understand what pain points they experienced with their previous platform and how we might be able to relieve those.”
After gathering that information, Elyse attempts to discover what other tools her customers might be using in their digital tech stack and make recommendations accordingly. She says Squarespace websites can often integrate with those platforms or support the same objectives with solutions in the Squarespace toolkit.
“Perhaps a customer is using another email marketing tool, and they want to keep everything together—then I’ll introduce them to Email Campaigns,” she explains. “People don’t always know everything that’s available to them with Squarespace, so I take that opportunity to make suggestions.”
Elyse also leaves ample time during her onboarding sessions for customers to address any pressing questions they have or tap her for expert consultation on any workflow-related topic, such as team onboarding, larger group trainings, or navigating the Enterprise dashboard and role permissions.
“I want to make sure my customers feel they’re being heard, and the onboarding meeting is really their time to shine,” she says.
Leading Squarespace Enterprise product improvements with feature requests
Another important part of being an account manager is advocating on behalf of Squarespace Enterprise customers for product needs. Customers often approach Elyse with feature ideas to improve their workflows. She takes all feedback seriously, and, on behalf of her customers, she submits feature requests for the Squarespace product team to review. If she’s aware of an alternative existing solution, she shares that, too.
“I do my best to be a mediator between my clients and the Squarespace product and engineering teams. If clients feel that a feature is missing or something is lacking, it's my duty to report it to those teams and then track progress on that request,” she says.
Elyse summarizes all feature requests and their details in a document that she submits to the proper colleagues and then meets with them if necessary for clarification. She keeps customers updated through each stage of the Squarespace review process and reports back to them on their submission’s approval status (and later, if approved, its development status).
“I always like to deliver good news when I’m able to,” she says. “I genuinely care about whether people enjoy their time working with Squarespace. If my customers are seeing success, then I’m happy.”
Strengthening the Squarespace Enterprise account manager-customer relationship
Elyse stays in communication with each of her customers on a schedule that works for them, which often means regular video conferences. After each video conference, she sends a follow-up email to summarize the discussion and outline any action items or next steps. If a customer prefers to exclusively work with her over email as needed, she’s happy to do that, too.
All Squarespace Enterprise account managers have extensive product knowledge and experience that equip them to provide consultative services. Before being promoted to her current role, Elyse spent her first few years at Squarespace as a customer support advisor, where she sharpened her problem-solving skills in preparation for the demands of enterprise account services.
“I want my clients to know that I’m very knowledgeable about our product and equipped to show them how to use it in the best way,” she says.
Elyse maintains her focus on problem solving throughout her customer relationships and takes a diagnostic approach while listening to feedback. She sees much of her value as an account manager in making holistic recommendations for customers’ workflows and helping them streamline their internal processes with Squarespace wherever it makes sense.
“As the account manager, it’s my job to see where they haven’t yet put together the puzzle pieces,” she says. “I can say, ‘I think things will work better this way, and here are the reasons why.’”
Squarespace Enterprise account managers serve as strategic business partners and collaborators in your success, helping you navigate roadblocks and increase adoption within your organization. Their custom guidance can maximize your progress with the Squarespace product suite.
