The Brief
Strategic product pivot to increase ACV by 400%
Orbiit was an AI-powered community matchmaking platform that connected members of professional networks through automated 1:1 introductions. Organisations like
Spendesk’s CFO Connect,
Modern Fertility’s 55,000+ member network, and
VC Platform’s global investment community used it to drive engagement.
But as in-person events returned post-Covid, CEO Bilyana Freye spotted a bigger opportunity: repurposing Orbiit's matchmaking technology to help B2B SaaS companies drive growth through strategic relationship-building. The pivot was high-stakes. Orbiit had to redesign the product for enterprise buyers, reposition the messaging for a completely new market, and protect existing ARR from community customers who had built their workflows around the platform. They needed a partner who could lead the strategy, not just execute the design.
Co-Founders Bilyana Freye and Luuk Derksen
While these use cases were effective, they primarily served niche communities rather than driving scalable revenue growth.
To expand into a larger, more sustainable market, Orbiit faced the challenge of transforming a product built for community managers into one that could help B2B SaaS companies drive growth through relationship-building at scale.
This shift came with risks, though. Orbiit had to reposition their messaging and redesign their product while making sure that existing customers – many of whom had built their communities around the platform – didn’t feel left behind. There were real concerns around affordability for their community users, the risk of losing ARR if those customers didn’t renew, and whether the transition would alienate their early adopters. They needed a partner who could help them navigate the shift strategically.
The Solution
From community tool to B2B growth engine
As we moved through the plan and saw the impact from early experimentations, we started to develop a good understanding of the deeper work involved. Three distinct work streams emerged:
- Iteratively shipping and refining product features with the engineering team
- Supporting the sales team in building a pipeline through new messaging, landing pages and messaging prototypes
- Making sure customer success teams had the tools and insights they needed to drive adoption and retention
We were also able to identify an unexpected advantage – some larger B2B clients were already adapting Orbiit’s community-first product for their needs because it filled a niche that no other tool did as effectively.
Recognising this, we prioritised making Orbiit even better at these existing use cases before focusing on acquisition, activation, and retention improvements. This meant doubling down on product strengths that were already driving value for bigger B2B customers while making sure community users still had a seamless experience.
Taking the plunge to get to the important details
We dove headfirst into Orbiit's world – working side-by-side with their team through intense strategy sessions, user interviews, and late-night whiteboarding. An immersive approach that gave us the insights needed to reinvent their product from the inside out.
-> Rapid-fire strategy sprints that mapped the entire B2B SaaS ecosystem in days, not weeks
-> Guerrilla-style competitor analysis that exposed critical gaps in the market
-> Direct conversations with 15+ potential B2B customers to validate our hypotheses, revealing specific needs, wants, and friction points across the B2B SaaS landscape
-> Multi-dimensional research that covered user behaviours, market dynamics, and competitive positioning
We uncovered a key insight: every B2B SaaS leader we spoke to wanted to "do more with less" – this became our rallying cry and the foundation for everything that followed.
Transforming the product at its core – and refining it
Drawing on insights from our immersive research on Orbiit’s target customers and the wider market, we reimagined what Orbiit could be and designed a platform that spoke directly to the needs of B2B SaaS leaders.
✅ Redesigned product experience and enhanced UX for B2B decision-makers
✅ Comprehensive product review addressing multiple points of friction and improving key customer metrics: activation and retention
✅ Clear development roadmap prioritising features for the B2B market
The evolved platform delivered:
- An executive dashboard showing relationship ROI at a glance
- Member profiles that surfaced relevant connection opportunities
- Seamless integration with the SaaS tech stack (Salesforce, HubSpot, etc.)
- Enterprise-grade API allowing customers to embed matchmaking into their own products
We then focused on meticulously refining Orbiit's user experience so that every aspect resonated with the new target audience. Key areas of work included:
→ Streamlining the user interface: Redesigning the UI for simplicity and intuitiveness, tailored for B2B user engagement
→ Optimising onboarding: Revamping the onboarding process to make it more engaging and informative for the B2B SaaS audience
→ Developing strategic features: Creating and integrating new features specifically designed to meet the needs of the B2B market
A key part of our approach was working extremely closely with Orbiit’s sales-focused founder and their sales and customer success teams. Typically, these teams operate in separate silos, but we helped bring them together by applying a UX-focused, design-thinking approach.
Our strategy here was simple: to integrate insights from sales and customer success directly into product design, so that the value proposition resonated with prospective B2B clients. This alignment led to a more streamlined sales process, stronger messaging for booking new meetings, and a clearer strategy for upselling and renewing larger non-community customers.
