Lean product development enabled Firsthand’s acquisition within 12 months
Firsthand was an engagement and mentoring platform for higher education and non-profit institutions.
Industry
EdTech
Stage
Seed → Acquisition
Startup → Accelerated-Growth
Acquired by Infobase
key Expertise
Product Strategy
Agile Product Development
Lean UX
Design Systems
Overview
challenge
Firsthand was facing imminent financial deadlines and constraints – the last two potential buyers fell through. To secure an acquisition, a successful turnaround in both business and product health metrics was imperative.
Solution
We swiftly delivered the backlog of premium add-on features for our committed customers. Additionally, in response to the pandemic, we swiftly launched new premium features to attract new customers and offer additional value to our existing customer base.
Impact
The efficient product development process set the path to rapidly released premium features. The substantial growth in revenue played a pivotal role in Firsthand being acquired within a year.
Why it matters
Adopting a systems approach implemented organization-wide best practices for setting revenue-driven goals and implementing agile product development methodologies.
Approach
To achieve an immediate impact on revenue, it was necessary to enhance the efficiency and predictability of our product development process. By adopting a systems approach, we implemented frameworks such as revenue-driven goal setting and agile product development. This enabled us to prioritize the backlog effectively and accelerate feature releases.
When the pandemic emerged, we leveraged our newly implemented agile development process and design system to swiftly respond with much-needed new premium features that catered to the urgent requirements of our customers.
Key Insights
The previous product development process was inefficient, sluggish, and outdated, causing difficulties for both the Engineering and Customer Success teams. It was challenging to comprehend the criteria used to determine priorities, anticipate release timelines, and gauge the potential impact on the business and customers. This lack of transparency resulted in wasted time and missed opportunities, as the team was unable to stay competitive and failed to capitalize on emerging trends.
Main Outcome
By aligning the product and engineering priorities with revenue targets and implementing a more efficient and predictable product development process, we were able to effectively deliver premium features that not only positively impacted our bottom-line but also upheld our exceptional retention rates and NPS scores.
Impact
Swift rollout of premium features led to a surge in revenue, enabling Firsthand to be acquired within just 12 months.
During the initial three-month period, our streamlined approach to product development led to a substantial reduction in resolution time, shrinking it from 30 days to a mere 3 days. Moreover, by the conclusion of the first quarter, we successfully released 25% of the backlog of premium add-on features that had committed customers, while 40% were still under development.
In the subsequent three-month period, in response to the increased demand stemming from the pandemic, we efficiently launched a new premium feature within a span of 6 weeks. As the second quarter drew to a close, we were pleased to note that approximately 12 customers, including prestigious institutions such as Harvard and UConn, had either purchased or expressed their commitment to buy the new feature.
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