Customer Success Manager

About the role

You will own the complete post-sale journey for a defined portfolio of wholesale distribution customers, ensuring they derive maximum value from the Canals platform. This role requires you to blend strategic relationship management with hands-on technical problem-solving to drive successful adoption. You will lead onboarding and training initiatives, translating complex platform capabilities into clear actions for non-technical teams. A core part of your responsibility is to monitor health metrics and usage data to proactively identify expansion opportunities and mitigate renewal risks. You will act as a key liaison between customers and internal Product and Engineering teams to ensure feedback directly influences product evolution. This position is ideal for someone who thrives in fast-moving, ambiguous environments and enjoys building processes from the ground up. Ultimately, you will champion a customer-first mindset and help shape the playbooks that define how Canals delivers long-term value.

Key facts

What you'll do

• Own a portfolio of customer relationships, driving adoption, retention, and timely renewals for wholesale distribution clients.
• Lead end-to-end onboarding and training sessions to ensure rapid, confident platform rollout across sales, operations, and finance teams.
• Monitor usage analytics and engagement trends to uncover adoption gaps, identify at-risk accounts, and surface upsell opportunities.
• Partner closely with Product and Engineering to translate customer feedback into actionable insights and efficient issue resolution.
• Facilitate strategic business reviews that clearly demonstrate ROI and align customer goals with platform roadmaps.
• Contribute to the creation, documentation, and evolution of scalable systems, playbooks, and standard operating procedures.
• Act as a customer advocate within Canals, ensuring every interaction reflects the company's core values of ownership and transparency.
• Explain complex platform functionality and AI-driven features to non-technical stakeholders in clear, operational terms.
• Maintain detailed records of customer interactions, health scores, and outcomes to support data-driven decision-making.
• Proactively identify workflow bottlenecks and collaborate with internal teams to design automation solutions for distributors.
• Support the launch of new modules and features by defining success metrics, monitoring adoption, and collecting structured feedback.
• Work with customers in industrial, logistics, and supply-chain sectors to address unique operational and compliance requirements.
• Build and maintain trusted relationships at multiple organizational levels, from warehouse managers to executive stakeholders.
• Document best practices and use cases that can be leveraged across the customer base to accelerate overall adoption.

Requirements

• You typically bring 5-8 years of Customer Success experience within B2B SaaS environments, ideally in distribution or logistics contexts.
• You have direct experience building playbooks, processes, and systems from scratch in an early-stage or high-growth startup.
• You have a proven track record of driving product adoption, utilization rates, and effective end-user training programs.
• You own renewals and retention initiatives, demonstrating clear success in expanding and retaining a book of business.
• You are comfortable navigating high levels of ambiguity and taking initiative to create clarity, structure, and process where none exists.
• You possess strong communication and relationship-building skills that enable effective collaboration across all levels of an organization.
• You can comfortably explain technical concepts, workflows, and data models to non-technical audiences without losing nuance.
• You are highly organized, analytically minded, and proactive, consistently spotting risks early and taking swift corrective action.
• You have direct experience supporting B2B or enterprise customers, understanding their unique procurement and operational cycles.
• You are willing to travel within the Chicago region for customer visits, workshops, and stakeholder meetings as required.
• You are available to work during standard business hours, with occasional flexibility to support critical customer milestones or time-sensitive launches.
• You hold eligibility to work in the United States without sponsorship, as no visa support can be provided for this position.
• You are prepared to commit to a full-time schedule of 40 hours per week, aligning with team and customer coverage needs.
• You understand that this role operates within a fast-paced, evolving environment where priorities can shift rapidly based on customer demands.
• You are committed to maintaining confidentiality and handling sensitive customer and operational data with the utmost integrity.

Nice to have

• You have supported the launch or rollout of new products or features, helping define success metrics, feedback loops, and post-launch reviews.
• You have experience working with non-technical customers in industrial, logistics, or supply-chain environments where operational efficiency is critical.
• You are passionate about AI, automation, or operational efficiency in complex business systems and actively explore new applications of these technologies.

Practical notes

This role is based in Chicago and requires full-time commitment, amounting to 40 hours per week. Occasional travel within the Chicago region may be required for in-person customer engagements, workshops, and strategic reviews. No visa sponsorship is available for this position, and candidates must hold authorization to work in the United States. The schedule follows standard business hours, with flexibility as needed to meet critical customer milestones, product launches, or implementation deadlines.