{"slug":"strategy/business-strategy/47-renewal-strategy","title":"47 — Renewal Strategy","section":"strategy","sectionLabel":"Strategy","status":"unclassified","type":"document","path":"strategy/business-strategy/47-renewal-strategy.mdx","bytes":7240,"description":null,"updated":null,"source":"integratewise/Integratewise-docs-wiki","content":"\nStatus: CANONICAL · Commercial OS\nOwner: Founder (CS)\nLast verified: 2026-07-21\n\n---\n\n## Purpose\n\nHow renewals are won — starting day one, not day 335. The thesis: a renewal is the closing argument of a case built all year; if we're _arguing_ at renewal time, we already lost the year.\n\n**Target audience:** CS operator; finance (forecasting); sales (multi-year and Enterprise renewals).\n\n---\n\n## 1. The Renewal Thesis\n\nTwo assets win every renewal, and both are built continuously:\n\n1. **The evidence file** — realized outcomes vs. promised, in their numbers, accumulated through day-30/60/90/quarterly reviews ([28 §4](../05-value-pricing/28-customer-outcomes.md)). At renewal, the proposal's ROI slide reappears _filled in with reality_. No new deck; the same story, completed.\n2. **The continuity asset** — what the Spine now holds that exists nowhere else: verified organizational memory, account histories with provenance, handover-proof context. The honest renewal question isn't \"was it worth it?\" but \"what would reconstructing this cost?\" — and unlike lock-in vendors, we let them export it, which is exactly why the argument works. _Switching is possible; it's just genuinely not worth it._\n\nCanonical line: _\"Point solutions solve a moment in time. Continuity compounds.\"_\n\n## 2. The Renewal Timeline (T = renewal date)\n\n| When              | Action                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 |\n| ----------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |\n| **T−365 (day 1)** | Baselines locked ([45](45-onboarding-playbook.md)); success plan = the future renewal case                                                                                                                                                             |\n| **T−120**         | Renewal health check: three health dimensions ([44 §2](44-customer-success-playbook.md)) · realized-vs-promised ratio · champion/sponsor stability. Classify: **Green** (evidence strong) / **Yellow** (gaps, fixable) / **Red** (at-risk play, below) |\n| **T−90**          | Green: expansion-with-renewal framing begins ([46](46-expansion-strategy.md) — renewal + second bench beats flat renewal). Yellow: gap-closure sprint with named owners (ours vs. theirs, honestly split). Red: at-risk play                           |\n| **T−60**          | Renewal review meeting (not a QBR — explicitly the renewal conversation): evidence file walked; continuity asset named; proposal delivered (flat / expansion / multi-year options)                                                                     |\n| **T−30**          | Paper in motion ([32](../05-value-pricing/32-licensing-strategy.md)); procurement packet refreshed ([43](../07-sales/43-procurement-faq.md)); no surprises left                                                                                        |\n| **T**             | Signature. Retro logged: what won/what wobbled → this doc, quarterly                                                                                                                                                                                   |\n\n**No-surprise rule:** nothing appears at T−60 that wasn't visible at T−120. Price changes respect the contractual cap (max(7%, CPI), 60-day notice). Auto-renew exists on paper; we never lean on it — a renewal nobody decided is churn deferred.\n\n## 3. The At-Risk Play (Red at T−120)\n\n1. **Diagnose honestly, out loud, with them:** adoption failure (ours to fix — rerun onboarding plays [44 §4](44-customer-success-playbook.md)) vs. outcome shortfall (split the ledger: connector gaps ours, workflow non-adoption shared, org turmoil theirs) vs. sponsor loss (champion-change play) vs. budget squeeze (commercial flexibility within policy).\n2. **Shrink to the core:** offer seat reduction to the activated core rather than lose the logo — a healthy 10-seat renewal beats a churned 25. (Exception: wrong-fit accounts per [33 Anti-ICP](../06-customers/33-ideal-customer-profile.md) — let them go gracefully; they should never have been sold.)\n3. **The last honest meeting:** if it's ending, end it well — full export delivered, offboarding clean, door open. Churned-well accounts return and refer; churned-badly accounts post.\n\n## 4. Renewal Commercial Structures\n\n| Situation                      | Offer                                                                                                                                                                            |\n| ------------------------------ | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |\n| Green + expansion appetite     | Renewal + V3 bench in one order form; multi-year with year-2 lock ([30 §3](../05-value-pricing/30-pricing-strategy.md))                                                          |\n| Green, steady-state            | Flat renewal at capped uplift; plant next-year expansion seeds                                                                                                                   |\n| Design-partner year-1 → year-2 | Contractual step −50% → −20% ([32 §4](../05-value-pricing/32-licensing-strategy.md)); the realized-value review carries the price step — never apologize for it, it was the deal |\n| Yellow                         | Renewal with a 90-day success-plan addendum (committed fixes, both sides named)                                                                                                  |\n| Budget-pressured Green         | Term flexibility before price concession; discounts only per policy floor                                                                                                        |\n\n## 5. Forecasting Discipline\n\nRenewal forecast maintained rolling-4-quarters: each account carries classification (G/Y/R) from T−120, updated monthly · GRR/NRR forecast rolls into [72 Revenue Metrics](../13-operations/72-revenue-metrics.md) · every churn gets a written post-mortem (reason-coded: adoption / outcome / sponsor / budget / wrong-fit) feeding [33 ICP](../06-customers/33-ideal-customer-profile.md) and [44](44-customer-success-playbook.md) quarterly revisions.\n\n**KPIs:** GRR ≥ 92% annual-equivalent · NRR ≥ 120% at scale · % renewals classified by T−120 = 100% · renewal meetings held by T−60 = 100% · at-risk saves ≥ 50% of Reds · churn post-mortem completion = 100%.\n\n---\n\n**Related:** [44 CS Playbook](44-customer-success-playbook.md) · [46 Expansion](46-expansion-strategy.md) · [28 Outcomes](../05-value-pricing/28-customer-outcomes.md) · [29 ROI](../05-value-pricing/29-roi-framework.md) · [72 Revenue Metrics](../13-operations/72-revenue-metrics.md)\n"}