Salary Data

Salary Data Methodology

How we collect, process, and present customer success compensation data.

Data Collection

Our salary data comes from public job postings for customer success roles across the United States. We track postings from major job boards, company career pages, and aggregator sites. The current dataset includes 1,261 total roles, of which 750 (59.5%) include disclosed salary information.

We focus on roles with "Customer Success" in the title or description, including CSM, Customer Success Manager, Customer Success Associate, CS Director, VP of Customer Success, and related titles. We exclude pure sales, pure support, and pure account management roles unless they are explicitly labeled as customer success.

Salary Extraction

Salary data is extracted from job postings that include explicit compensation ranges. We capture the minimum and maximum of the stated range. When a posting lists a single number, we treat it as both the minimum and maximum. We do not estimate salaries for postings that do not disclose them.

Our salary figures represent base compensation. When OTE (on-target earnings) is listed separately, we use the base component. When only OTE is provided without a base breakdown, we exclude the role from base salary analysis to avoid inflating the numbers.

Seniority Classification

We classify roles into six seniority levels based on title keywords:

Entry: Associate, Junior, Coordinator, Specialist (level I/1)
Mid: Customer Success Manager, CSM, Customer Success Associate (standard titles)
Senior: Senior, Lead, Staff, Principal
Director: Director of Customer Success, Senior Director
VP: Vice President, SVP, AVP
Head of: Head of Customer Success

Roles that do not match any pattern are classified as "Unknown" and excluded from seniority-specific analysis. This affects 178 roles in the current dataset.

Location Classification

Metro areas are determined from the location field in job postings. We map city names and regions to metro areas. "Remote" roles are those explicitly listed as fully remote or "anywhere in the US." Hybrid roles are classified under their office metro area.

Roles with no identifiable location are classified as "Unknown" (445 roles) and excluded from location-specific analysis.

Statistical Methods

We report three primary metrics for each segment:

Median: The middle value when all salaries are sorted. More robust than the mean for salary data because it is not skewed by outliers.
Average Low (Min Base Avg): The average of all minimum salary values in the range. Represents the typical floor for a segment.
Average High (Max Base Avg): The average of all maximum salary values. Represents the typical ceiling.

We use the median as the primary benchmark because salary distributions are typically right-skewed (a small number of very high salaries pull the mean up). The median gives a more accurate picture of what a typical CS professional earns.

Limitations

Our data has several known limitations:

Disclosure bias. Companies that disclose salaries may not be representative of all employers. States with pay transparency laws contribute disproportionately to our dataset.
Title inflation. Some companies use inflated titles for lower-level roles. A "Senior CSM" at one company may do the same work as a "CSM" at another.
Sample sizes. Some segments have small sample sizes (e.g., "Head of CS" with 3 roles). Small samples are reported but should be interpreted cautiously.
Point-in-time. Our data reflects current job postings, not what people are actually earning. Incumbent employees may earn more or less than current posting ranges.

Updates and Corrections

We update the dataset weekly. If you spot an error or have questions about our methodology, contact us at rome@getprovyx.com.

Frequently Asked Questions

How often is the salary data updated?

We collect new job posting data weekly. The dataset is refreshed every Monday with the latest postings. Historical data is retained for trend analysis.

Where does the data come from?

All data comes from public job postings for customer success roles. We currently track 1,261 total roles, of which 750 have disclosed salary information.

How do you determine seniority levels?

Seniority is classified based on job title keywords. 'Associate,' 'Junior,' and 'Coordinator' map to Entry. Standard CSM/CSA titles map to Mid. 'Senior' and 'Lead' map to Senior. 'Director,' 'VP,' and 'Head of' map to their respective levels.

Why do some roles not have salary data?

Only 59.5% of CS job postings disclose salary ranges. The remaining roles say 'competitive compensation' or do not mention pay. Our salary analysis uses only the 750 roles with disclosed data.