Bonsai, a managed platform that enables superior search capabilities for modern connected software, purchased Gainsight to streamline its renewal process and help account managers identify expansion opportunities. nCloud Integrators assisted Bonsai with its Gainsight Essentials implementation.
Kendall Beckelhymer, Senior Enterprise Account Manager with Bonsai, discusses changes to the company’s renewal process and how customer account visibility has created alignment and streamlined interactions.
What were your top three objectives you wanted to accomplish with your Gainsight
implementation?
Our primary objectives for the initial launch were to roll out processes to identify risks early,
manage the renewal process and track onboarding engagements. We also wanted to create a health scorecard with inputs from support and engagement metrics. Support metrics are really important for us because of our “99.9% uptime promise” to customers that our solution is working as guaranteed.
Was there anything unique about your Gainsight Implementation?
I think most of the traditional Gainsight implementations focus on adoption to improve the work of Customer Success Managers. Our focus was mainly on the Account Management side with renewals and expansion opportunities. We wanted to streamline our account management process so our AMs could effectively manage more accounts. We also needed a good way to give everyone internally who touches our customers visibility into customer metrics, including support metrics and product consumption. The ability to view and track consumption over time is important for us because it gives us the ability to discuss new thresholds and expansion opportunities with customers.
What was the biggest advantage to using nCloud to help with your implementation?
From day one, the implementation process was very well-organized, with the sessions
scheduled up front so we knew the cadence for our implementation and what topics would be covered every week. This helped our team prepare for upcoming implementation steps and decisions that needed to be made around these steps. For example, when the health scorecard session was coming up, we had a meeting before this date to make decisions about the metrics we wanted to use.
Also, I used to work at Gainsight, so I am familiar with the system and what it can do. Because we have unique account management needs, we had some different system implementation requests. Our nCloud Integrators Consultant was very patient and was able to figure out ways to make Gainsight work within our business processes. Overall, it was a very positive experience for us.
How has your renewal process changed?
Before we implemented Gainsight, there was no formal process to manage renewals. nCloud Integrators helped us put in place a very simple workflow that is easy to use. Now, when a renewal closes, we track it in timeline, and then a rule loads this renewal date and other details into the customer record so it can be managed over time. Then we put a playbook into place based on this renewal date. We are now able to identify upgrade opportunities during the renewal process due to new visibility into customer contracts and consumption rates.
How are you using customer health?
We are tracking a number of key metrics, including sentiment, executive engagement, and
accounts at risk. Everyone has visibility into these metrics, and we meet on a regular basis to discuss accounts coming up for renewal including those that might be good expansion opportunities or those at risk. Because of this enhanced customer visibility, our entire team is aligned and the account interaction is seamless.
DId nCloud help you overcome any difficult hurdles?
Yes, nCloud Integrators helped us bring data into Gainsight from various systems including
Pipedrive, Zendesk, and usage data. Bringing this customer information into one system is
going to save us so much time because we don’t have to sift through the contracts or try to
figure out where customers are from a consumption perspective. This is huge for us because this will enable us to identify risks and revenue opportunities much earlier.
Do you have any helpful tips for other companies looking to implement Gainsight?
Before you even start the implementation process, make sure you have the resources you need to assist with the data integration. You also need to decide specific priorities during the implementation phase, in terms of what is going to be manageable to accomplish during the initial rollout and make an impact to organizational processes. This initial focus will help you narrow down your decisions around things such as scorecard measures and Calls-to-Action (CTAs).
What is your team focused on next?
We will work with nCloud Integrator’s Expert Service team to launch Gainsight’s Adoption
Explorer. Today, we don’t have a way to analyze usage trends over time, so this will enable us to understand each customer’s usage trends and compare this to the consumption metrics. We also want to launch an NPS survey and add some additional data to the dashboards.