Episode 85 - Why retention plateaus + build in public

Welcome to episode 85 of The Retention Blueprint.

I want to talk about a pattern I see repeatedly across enterprise businesses.

CRM execution reaches a high level of maturity. 

Personalisation is strong. 

Journeys are well-built. 

Behavioural triggers are in place.

And yet retention performance plateaus.

Most teams respond by doing more, more journeys, more messages, more personalisation. 

And it moves the needle, but not enough.

This is almost never a CRM problem.

It is almost always a sequencing problem.

Retention is shaped by three interdependent levels. 

Each one must be sufficiently established before investment in the level above can deliver compounding returns.

The foundation is the value proposition, what you offer, to whom, and at what price. If this is weak, nothing upstream fixes it sustainably.

The second layer is acquisition quality, who you attract, and on what commercial terms. How you acquire customers shapes who stays.  

The final layer: moments of truth, how you manage the specific interactions that disproportionately define whether a customer stays or leaves.  

In framework 4, I go deep on the Retention Hierarchy of Needs.

👉 Read the full framework.

Lifecycle Strategy. AI executed. Build in Public. For a Subscription App Client. 

Building a lifecycle strategy is one thing. 

Getting it executed is another. 

It’s the same every time. Strategy defined, frameworks agreed, then months go by of briefing, writing, editing, template building, journey building and content loading. 

I am changing all this with AI for a subscription app client. 

Step 1: I write the client strategy (not automated). 

Step 2: I am encoding 26 years of CRM and retention IP, my CRM Marketing strategy course and nearly 100 frameworks into my retention second brain (Obsidian + Claude Skill). 

Step 3: Then I am using it to produce a communications matrix and then to rapidly produce all content, including copy and Nano Banana image briefs. 

Step 4: Then, I am using Claude Code to write the scripts that load everything directly into Airship via an API. Journeys, copy, image URLs.

The client goes from strategy to fully live, hyper-personalised lifecycle journeys across every moment of truth and every micro-segment in days, not months.

No journey building, no content loading. No developer code. 

I'm building it in public. Follow along on LinkedIn or in this newsletter for deeper dives.  

Every episode, I’ll update on what worked, what didn't, and what broke. 

👉Build in public announcement

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Until next time, 

Tom