Net Revenue Retention (NRR) is under pressure across the board.
In SBI’s latest analysis of more than 150 B2B companies, we found that 58% have seen NRR decline over the past two years, with average performance dropping from 110.8% to 107.2%. That shift alone is alarming, but the downstream impact is even more significant: 71% of companies with declining NRR are also missing their overall growth targets.
In other words, falling NRR is more than a Customer Success (CS) problem. It’s a signal that your entire commercial model may be misaligned with how value is created and sustained inside your base. So, what’s driving the drop, and more importantly, how are market leaders solving it?
Many companies have responded to NRR pressures by spinning up new CS programs, tweaking pricing, or launching retention campaigns. Those things help briefly. But they often miss the deeper issue.
NRR isn’t just a metric. It’s an output. And what drives it isn’t effort, it’s how clearly your GTM model is designed to retain and expand revenue after the initial sale.
In our work with executive teams, we see a consistent challenge: even the most sophisticated organizations are overly indexed on acquisition. They’re excellent at generating pipeline but inconsistent at protecting and growing the value of what’s already been won.
Too often:
And in this kind of system, NRR falls through the cracks.
Through SBI’s research and advisory work, we’ve identified four deliberate practices that separate NRR leaders from the rest. These organizations aren’t working harder post-sale; they’re working smarter, with clearer roles, better orchestration, and tighter focus on where growth is actually possible.
The best companies don’t pursue expansion broadly. They prioritize a narrow band of accounts where they have both a right to win and room to grow—typically based on intent data, usage signals, and firmographic fit.
By contrast, average performers are 4x more likely to spread GTM resources across too many accounts with low expansion potential, resulting in wasted cycles and missed growth targets. NRR leaders double down where the signal is strong.
That means:
Renewing an existing product is not the same as selling new functionality or converting a small team into an enterprise account. High-performing companies separate these motions structurally.
They create:
This model removes confusion, drives ownership, and ensures that expansion is managed with the same rigor as new logo acquisition.
In underperforming companies, CS often ends up in a reactive, execution-heavy role answering tickets, chasing NPS, and keeping customers “happy” with no real connection to revenue outcomes. NRR leaders take a different approach: they turn CS into a commercial function. That doesn’t mean every CSM carries a quota, but it does mean:
Critically, these organizations invest in enablement for CS, recognizing that many CSMs were hired for technical depth or relational skill, not commercial acumen. If you want CS to drive revenue, you must train and equip them to do it.
Too many companies treat customer engagement like a baton pass where marketing generates leads, sales closes the deal, and CS takes over post-sale. The best-performing companies don’t hand customers off; they stay connected through a unified lifecycle model. They:
These companies aren’t building departments. They’re building systems that drive value consistently because every part of the GTM engine is aligned around the same customer outcomes.
Growth from the base is no longer a nice-to-have. It’s the fastest, most capital-efficient way to hit targets in a capital-constrained, high-scrutiny environment. Yet many executive teams still treat NRR like an operational issue instead of a strategic lever. That’s a mistake.
If you’re not growing inside your base, you’re already behind. Throwing more sellers at the acquisition won’t fix it. As boards and investors demand more profitable growth, the companies that outperform will be the ones that can design their operating models to expand predictably.
Whether you're leading revenue, strategy, or the entire organization, it’s worth pausing to ask:
If you’re unsure, you’re not alone. But this is fixable. The companies that get this right aren’t just raising NRR. They’re reducing risk, increasing predictability, and creating a GTM model built for long-term value.
SBI’s latest research report, How Market Leaders Reverse Declining NRR, walks through the data behind the NRR slide and how top performers are redesigning their teams, roles, and motions to grow from the base.