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Can AI Really Manage Your Entire Renewal Book? ft. Grant Clarke (Gainsight))
[Un]Churned – The No. 1 Podcast for Customer RetentionShow Notes
Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.
The future of customer renewals is here. And it's AI-native. Josh Schachter sits down with Grant Clarke, EVP & GM of Gainsight Atlas, to explore how AI agents combined with human renewal managers are transforming the renewal landscape. Grant, a 15-year veteran of renewal operations at ServiceSource, explains how Atlas manages entire renewal books through an outcome-based model—not software licensing. Discover why deploying AI agents in renewals is harder than it looks, how Gainsight is pioneering a new category called AI Native Services (AINS), and why the long tail of customers just became manageable. Plus: the surprising story behind Grant's 15 beehives outside Nashville.
--- What You'll Learn - How AI agents are transforming customer renewals at scale - Why deploying AI agents in renewals is fundamentally hard - The margin economics that make productizing AI agents profitable - Why the long tail of customers is now economically viable to serve - How combining AI + human renewal managers creates better customer outcomes
--- Timestamps 0:00 - Preview & Meet Grant Clarke 2:00 - What is Atlas? 4:50 - Grant's Background: ServiceSource & Dropbox 11:05 - How Atlas onboards a new customer 13:04 - Data hygiene: "The D word" 14:21 - The ideal customer profile for Atlas 16:20 A day in the life: the Atlas cockpit 17:55 - When the agent hands off to a human 19:05 - The learning loop: forward deployed engineers & 2-week sprints 20:10 - The business model: avoiding the pure-services trap 22:04 - Mirage PMF: go fast, go slow, go fast again 23:35 - What's next for Atlas: Agentic judgment and renewal edge cases 26:40 - Can AINS hit 70% gross margins? 26:35 The renewal action inventory: 10–25 actions per renewal 28:38 From 20% to 55% agent-led actions: margin accretion 29:43 Grant's 15 beehives outside Nashville 32:39 Wrap-up
--- Josh is writing a book on building customer relationships. Follow his journey and insights at www.joshschachter.com
--- Where to Find the Guest Grant Clarke: https://www.linkedin.com/in/grantclarke/
--- Where to Find the Hosts: Josh's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jschachter/ Unchurned Substack: https://unchurned.substack.com/
More from [Un]Churned – The No. 1 Podcast for Customer Retention
Is AI still an experiment on your customer success team, or is it delivering results?
Most companies treat renewals as a sales function. The real shift is treating retention as a job for the whole company.
Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.
Most companies think of customer success as a support function that ships software. The real shift is treating it as a co-build practice that ships outcomes.
Want the playbook, not just the conversation? Subscribe for deep-dive, actionable breakdowns from every episode at unchurned.substack.com.