Propel your customer success career in high-growth startups.

The Startmate x Kirsty Traill Customer Success Fellowship is built to supercharge the careers of those working in (or aspiring to work in) customer-facing roles.

Over the course of 6 weeks, you will learn world-class strategies for improving the customer experience, reducing churn, and ultimately, driving revenue.

Our MVP program is underway!

Cohort 2 dates will be announced in late-2022. Express your interest below to be informed when applications open.

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Inspired by Startmate’s original mentors.

First Believers is a six-month program inspired by Startmate’s original mentors. Back in 2010, these mentors believed in and backed early-stage Aussie founders. We're on a mission to find more people like them.We believe that to create a truly diverse and powerful startup ecosystem across Australia and New Zealand, we need fresh perspectives, thinking and networks at the investment table. First Believers is the catalyst for a new generation of investors to hone their craft.

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Technical to non-technical

“By the third day of my internship, I was already pitching to the Queensland Small Business Commission.”
— Tsamara, Student Fellow (Summer 2020/21)

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Solo founder to founding team

“The great thing about hiring through Startmate is the people who join through one of the Fellowship programs are already pre-selected for being amazing. They are looking for change and roles where they can have a big impact, and everything that working for a startup can provide.”
— Gridcognition (Startmate, Mel20 Alumni)

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Solo founder to founding team

“Why does the UK have such a financial services driven economy? Basically … ask the smartest undergraduates ‘what are you going to do next?’, they're all like, ‘oh, I'm going to go work at Goldman Sachs’ or whatever. … The reason Silicon Valley is so special? It is the one place in the world where [ambitious students] say ‘we’ll start a company’.”
— Matt Clifford, Founder at Entrepreneur First.

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Get access to 20+ years of experience in 6 weeks

Kirsty Traill is Chief Customer Officer at Shuttlerock and the brains behind this program.

In addition to getting access to Kirsty’s 20+ years of customer success experience, you’ll also learn from other industry experts, covering the following weekly topics.

Week 1: Model and strategy
Understand the different customer success models based on your company stage, how these evolve over time, and the strategy behind each model.

Week 2: Understanding your customer
Dive into the importance of defining your personas and their journey, and learn how to align your solution to their primary needs to drive engagement and deliver value realisation.

Week 3: Alignment and launch
Take a customer experience approach to customer success, define the sales-to-service handoff, recognise the importance of customer alignment, and develop robust kick-off and launch plans.

Week 4: Adoption and engagement
Learn how to drive customer adoption and engagement at scale to reduce churn risk and improve efficiency, and discover the role and value of customer marketing to create expansion opportunities.

Week 5: Value realisation and renewal
Understand how your customers define and measure value, as well as how to build a program to ensure they realise this value on their journey.

Week 6: Expansion and advocacy
Define cross and upsell programs, leverage white space mapping to develop expansion strategies, and learn the importance of customer advocacy.


Join a community for life

In addition to joining a community of ambitious people looking to excel in customer-facing roles, you’ll connect with Startmate’s community of startup founders, investors and operators.

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Find your dream customer-facing role

You’ll gain access to the Startmate Talent Engine, a platform that will connect you with startups looking for your skillset.

Why are we launching a Customer Success Fellowship?

To put it simply, we believe customer success plays a critical role in the success of any startup, as reducing churn and increasing retention and referrals ultimately result in increased revenue when done well.

We want to supercharge customer success careers and in turn, supercharge the startup ecosystem.

Who is right for the Customer Success Fellowship?

Our ideal Customer Success Fellows have been working in, or are aspiring to work in a customer-related field (think customer success, experience, service, support, sales and marketing).

How much does the program cost?

The Customer Success Fellowship program fee is $2,200 including GST.

Startmate offers full and half scholarships in special circumstances. Read more about our scholarships here. The fee will only be invoiced after program acceptance and can be paid upfront or via four fortnightly instalments.

Want to sign up as a group?

Group discounts are available if you sign up with three or more people from your company. Email hello@startmate.com.au if this is you.

What else do I need to know?

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This is our inaugural Customer Success Fellowship cohort.
As the program is run remotely, we encourage you to apply from anywhere across Australia or New Zealand.

The Customer Success Fellowship runs 6 weeks with a time commitment of 3-4 hours per week.
There will be 2 weekly sessions: a content session including both theoretical and practical elements on Wednesday from 12-1.30pm AEST, and a second panel or practical session on Thursday from 12-1pm AEST.

Want to join our inaugural Customer Success Fellowship cohort?