PostHog Handbook Library / CS and Onboarding

572 words. Estimated reading time: 3 min.

# Common churn reasons

Some recurring reasons customers churn, and what we can do about them.

### Things we can influence

#### Champion leaves

If our champion was the main user, their departure is high risk. The best defense: get more people across the org using PostHog before it happens. More teams using PostHog, more products adopted, more relationships across the org. Build relationships with more than one champion.

#### Champion isn't the decision maker

A great relationship with a non-decision-maker is good for context, but limits influence over PostHog adoption. Use them to introduce you to people who can actually move things — and remember decision-makers aren't always in leadership roles. Ensure team adoption, new feature roll-outs, or other key wins are consistently visible to decision-makers.

#### Customer replaces PostHog

Common reasons:

- They built feature parity internally
- We lack a critical feature
- Leadership prefers a competitor
- They got a sweetheart deal somewhere else

You can't always prevent this, but customers using multiple PostHog products are stickier. If they're switching for one specific need, you might keep them on the others.

When you spot a customer evaluating alternatives, get involved early and push for the changes that would keep them.

#### Poor customer experience

If a customer has struggled to get help or fast responses, turn it around by staying on top of their stuff going forward.

When you can solve a problem for them, solve it — and explain how, so they can do it themselves next time.

For feature requests, bugs, or anything else you're advocating for internally, circle back proactively. Don't wait for them to follow up. Provide updates if resolution is taking longer. Customers who've had a poor experience care most about communication and follow-through.

#### Customer can't extract value

Offer to work with their team. Set up regular meetings if they're open to it. Help them get the specific metrics that move the needle.

If their team doesn't understand how PostHog can help, run a workshop or training call with concrete examples.

#### Missing features or slow delivery

If they're an ICP fit, loop in the relevant PM and engineering team. PMs often want to talk directly to the customer.

Flag the churn risk openly in the team channel. We never want to lose a customer over a missing feature, but these conversations help our PMs prioritize.

#### Lack of trust in PostHog data

If a customer says PostHog data conflicts with what they see elsewhere, dig in. What stats are they comparing? Where's the implementation issue?

Customers who rely on a different source of truth are at long-term risk — they're not tied to PostHog. Fix this even when it's not an immediate threat.

#### Privacy, compliance, or data governance

Some customers have constraints we can't fully solve — e.g. they can't store data with third parties and need on-prem.

Make sure they know what privacy controls PostHog offers. We're anonymous by default, Session Replay masks sensitive data, and many customers don't realize what's possible. Useful links:

- Data collection
- URL masking
- Session replay privacy
- Cookieless tracking
- GDPR
- Data deletion

### Things we can't influence

#### Acquisition

Not an immediate risk, but acquired customers often move off eventually. Find out early what risks the acquisition introduces.

#### Customer shuts down

Nothing we can do.

#### Lack of ICP fit

This has come up more recently and it's tough. Figure out where we underserved them and why it wasn't a fit, then relay feedback to the team.

Canonical URL: https://posthog.com/handbook/cs-and-onboarding/churn-reasons

GitHub source: contents/handbook/cs-and-onboarding/churn-reasons.md

Content hash: `4d39ca8598a00e41`