Starting with a solid foundation of product analytics
For a consumer, ordering something from your favorite e-commerce site is as simple as the click of a button. But for the teams managing all of that inventory and fulfilling orders, making the buyer experience seamless—and getting orders out the door on time—takes lots of data and well-orchestrated processes to do well. And it’s all powered by software.
SkuVault is the engine that makes this behind-the-scenes inventory magic possible for small and medium-sized ecommerce businesses across the country. And as their own organization entered a high-growth phase, the SkuVault product team knew they needed improved visibility into how their clients were really leveraging the tool. Diana Nolting, vice president of product at SkuVault, explained, “We didn’t have the visibility we needed into understanding each individual account’s use with our product. So we went looking for a solution that could at first give us visibility—and Pendo Analytics did that.”
Nolting and her team were originally most concerned about gathering data to improve how specific segments of clients were engaging with the SkuVault platform—so they initially only purchased Pendo for its retroactive analytics capabilities. “[Pendo Analytics] told us who was using what, when, and really helped us create cohorts that went well beyond their industry segments,” said Nolting. “No two sellers are the same—they have different use cases and needs. Pendo Analytics gave us that baseline understanding of how to look at different groups of clients in different ways and better understand their needs.”
After just three months of seeing the impact Pendo Analytics had on the product team’s ability to make better data-informed decisions, Nolting decided to expand SkuVault’s Pendo investment into in-app guidance, too. “Once we had the data, it was time for us to take action on it and see how we could communicate with users differently,” she explained.
Reaching users (and the full potential of the platform) with in-app guides
Nolting and her team first leveraged Pendo In-app Guides to reimagine their onboarding process and allow new users to self-serve—because “not everybody wants to sit through one-on-one training.” Nolting also explained that for many warehouse teams, work typically happens outside of what most consider to be “normal” operating hours. “During the workday, [our clients’] stores are open—they’re fulfilling orders and running the warehouse. So their training, optimization, and configuration happens on the weekends, at night, or at two in the morning,” she said. “Now, with Pendo In-app Guides, we can show up for our clients whenever they need us, without needing to have a human resource there with them every step of the way.”
In addition to streamlining onboarding processes, adding in-app guides to the product also delivered another amazing benefit for the SkuVault team: reducing support tickets. “After implementing Pendo In-app Guides and continuing to adopt Pendo across our application, not only were we able to help enable onboarding and make sure everybody could get set up correctly, but we were actually cutting down on support tickets significantly,” explained Nolting. In just six months of using in-app guides to deliver micro-trainings and enablement videos within the product, SkuVault saw a 43% reduction in training request support tickets.
The marriage of Analytics and In-app Guides in the Pendo platform has been an incredible value driver for the SkuVault team in optimizing the experiences they deliver to their clients. Using data from Pendo Analytics, Nolting and her team are now able to build segments, identify usage trends by cohorts, and identify areas of the product where users need additional support. They then use this information to build targeted in-app resources and support through Pendo In-app Guides to help users get back on track and complete their workflows—without them ever needing to leave the app.
“Pendo allowed us to show up where our clients need us, when they need us, and how they need us,” said Nolting. “We thought we just needed analytics—but the value is really in the complete Pendo platform and actually being able to use that data to better engage our clients inside our product.”
What’s more, although SkuVault’s product team was the original driving force behind the decision to purchase Pendo, departments across the business are now reaping the benefits of the platform. Nolting explained, “We have salespeople logging in to watch their clients who have closed. We have CSMs and onboarding specialists watching client behaviors so they can deliver better coaching. We have product managers making better investment decisions. We have product design and UX now delivering better experiences and training materials in ways we couldn’t before. Everyone is finding different ways to use Pendo—and celebrating their own mini milestones along the way.”
