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The differences between customer success managers and desk managers can be seen in a few details. Each job has different responsibilities and duties. While it typically takes 6-8 years to become a customer success manager, becoming a desk manager takes usually requires 4-6 years. Additionally, a customer success manager has an average salary of $93,820, which is higher than the $75,140 average annual salary of a desk manager.
The top three skills for a customer success manager include client facing, cloud and account management. The most important skills for a desk manager are CRM, sales process, and quality customer service.
| Customer Success Manager | Desk Manager | |
| Yearly salary | $93,820 | $75,140 |
| Hourly rate | $45.11 | $36.12 |
| Growth rate | 5% | - |
| Number of jobs | 95,053 | 45,871 |
| Job satisfaction | - | - |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 78% | Bachelor's Degree, 65% |
| Average age | 46 | 47 |
| Years of experience | 8 | 6 |
A customer success manager works to understand repeat customers and prioritize their long-term needs. Primarily, they manage the customer relationship and give them prompt value propositions. They act as mentors to customers by educating them about the sales process and ensure efficient transaction processing. Their tasks include advocating for the company, onboarding customers to the products, follow-up on renewals, and encouraging cross-sells and upsells. Additionally, they build relationships with the customer and the support team as well as advocating customers' needs.
A desk manager's responsibilities focus on facilitating communication and performing organizational support tasks to maintain the smooth flow of operations at offices. Although the extent of their duties primarily depends on their company or employment industry, it usually includes handling calls and correspondence, answering inquiries, resolving issues and concerns, forwarding calls and messages, arranging appointments and schedules, organizing files, and overseeing various communication materials. In some offices, a desk manager manages different teams, supervising their performance while enforcing company standards and policies.
Customer success managers and desk managers have different pay scales, as shown below.
| Customer Success Manager | Desk Manager | |
| Average salary | $93,820 | $75,140 |
| Salary range | Between $61,000 And $142,000 | Between $44,000 And $127,000 |
| Highest paying City | Redwood City, CA | Eureka, CA |
| Highest paying state | California | New York |
| Best paying company | VMware | ServiceNow |
| Best paying industry | Technology | - |
There are a few differences between a customer success manager and a desk manager in terms of educational background:
| Customer Success Manager | Desk Manager | |
| Most common degree | Bachelor's Degree, 78% | Bachelor's Degree, 65% |
| Most common major | Business | Business |
| Most common college | University of Pennsylvania | California State University - Bakersfield |
Here are the differences between customer success managers' and desk managers' demographics:
| Customer Success Manager | Desk Manager | |
| Average age | 46 | 47 |
| Gender ratio | Male, 54.9% Female, 45.1% | Male, 54.9% Female, 45.1% |
| Race ratio | Black or African American, 3.2% Unknown, 4.4% Hispanic or Latino, 9.8% Asian, 4.1% White, 78.2% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.2% | Black or African American, 9.7% Unknown, 4.7% Hispanic or Latino, 18.0% Asian, 5.3% White, 61.6% American Indian and Alaska Native, 0.6% |
| LGBT Percentage | 7% | 8% |