The Work

The Panviva Board reached out to David for advice and the work started with an assessment. A key missing ingredient was compelling storytelling of customer success and an effort to replicate that success in the same vertical markets. The company had not captured customer success among its Australian client base and also had not done a comparative market assessment in the US to confirm similar market needs.

David began by interviewing and capturing stories from Panviva’s successful Australian and UK clients, including Medibank Private, British Telecom, National Australia Bank and Thomson Reuters. The interviews were not just about how they used the software but about the business challenges Panviva’s solution helped to address and the quantifiable business outcomes. Customer stories and testimonials were captured in written, audio and video form. The video testimonials from senior stakeholders (such as this one) proved to be an especially compelling precursor to personal references, alleviating the pain of scheduling live conversations across time zones.

David’s next order of business was to identify a US health insurance payer willing to conduct a trial and share “before and after” results. This approach was a way of confirming that there really was a market in the US for the company’s solution. The goal was to validate there was a need and a desire for a better way for call-center reps to find information and know what to do. The hypothesis was that unstructured searches formed the basis of knowledge management access and that a GPS-like guidance would improve user experience, speed information retrieval and improve accuracy and consistency. A tailored, outcome-focussed demo with the prospective trial customer confirmed this value and got them excited about the prospect of reduced average handling time for calls, reduced need for reps to confer with others to complete tasks, and reduced time-to-competency for new reps. Part of this was developing an ROI model that made clear what the ROI was based on shared assumptions. It showed the value of proceeding and also the value lost of not proceeding. The trial quickly expanded to the full call center. Most importantly, the process validated product-market fit. The answer to the “Is it real?” question was definitely yes. 

David then worked with the board to develop a new strategy, with a particular focus on turning around the US business. David came in as CEO with priorities to further assess the market potential, align the product-market fit, and understand and leverage product strengths and customer successes. He rebuilt the sales and marketing organization, honed in on messaging that resonated with target buyers, and developed segment-specific marketing and sales approaches (starting with healthcare insurance payers) to reach and build trust in the market. He coached the existing sales team, recruited new talent and expanded the team in the USA, Australia and the UK to fill skills gaps and grow capacity. To strengthen product alignment with market needs, he also established a new product management function and recruited a new leader for this team. Finally he engaged new R&D leadership to ensure faster and more reliable product and service, including more robust testing and quality control.

To enable sales and build market credibility, David oversaw thought leadership and content development and invested in a new website and marketing programs to tell a strong story in the US market. Customer success stories became a core element. In one particular early program to build awareness, a highly-successful UK customer in the healthcare insurance segment participated as a speaker in videos and live event programs aimed at opening up the US healthcare insurance market. This proved to be one of a number of effective strategies to fuel growth.

Since Analysts are a key trusted advisor for the US companies Panviva sought as customers, David and his team also prioritized strong analyst relations and honed messaging that highlighted Panviva’s differentiators. At the time, Forrester and others were providing feedback that the existing “knowledge management” vendors didn’t offer the “process guidance system” that Panviva brought to its solution. To leverage this difference and communicate its value, David and his team coined the term “Business Process Guidance” and emphasized it in analyst relations meetings. Analysts picked up on this terminology and made it their own.