Executive summary

Dataiku is a leading AI and machine learning platform. Before partnering with Khoros, Dataiku didn’t have a formal online community, though they did host a Q&A platform for customers. But the platform had no strategic plan and limited features. Dataiku wanted to more meaningfully connect with their user base and improve the customer experience, so they brought on new staff and evaluated software technology. Dataiku was looking for a customizable platform to ensure that the customer experience remained cohesive throughout their web properties. Analytics and gamification capabilities, as well as the ability to host different discussion styles (like blogs and knowledge-based forums), were also important features in a technology partner. Dataiku needed not just a vendor but an experienced partner that would be able to grow with them and support their success. They chose Khoros Communities.

The Dataiku team is an experienced group of community-building veterans who knew exactly the set of diverse resources they needed to succeed. This helped them secure early buy-in from all company stakeholders and ensure lasting investment in their community. They hired a full community team, including a developer, a manager, and moderation staff. They also added part time resources and buy-in from their design and branding team from the very beginning. They worked with Khoros to plan a detailed launch over several months. Dataiku also identified key super users and interviewed customers to understand what they wanted out of a community experience.

To ensure the success of their community, they launched in multiple phases, beginning with internal power users and super users. They gathered feedback and made crucial adjustments before the wider, public launch. Dataiku hosts a number of weekly challenges to engage community users in a fun way while supporting community onboarding and adoption and helping users explore new features. Dataiku partnered with their account team to track the progress of their community and identify opportunities to improve. The account team connects Dataiku with other customers so that they can learn from them. The team also shares best practices and provides Dataiku with helpful examples from other customers.

Dataiku’s preparation, including stakeholder engagement and buy-in, made Dataiku’s public community launch a success. In the first year, they logged 240k community visits (up 480% from when they hosted a Q&A platform) and had an accepted solution rate of 82%. Their launch was especially ambitious because they weren’t just launching a community; they also launched a customer success ecosystem to help with user advocacy and onboarding. Shortly after launching their community, Dataiku launched the Academy, their learning management system, and then they launched user groups with events. They hosted and centralized all of these tools and content through their community — making it the hub of their customer and partner engagement. Since launch, they’ve had two million solution views.

Dataiku’s product evolves quickly, and their community helps them ensure customers are utilizing their newest technology and are set up for success in terms of adoption and ease of use. Dataiku demonstrates that community members adopt their products faster, onboard faster, and are more likely to renew than other customers.

In the coming year, Dataiku plans to spend more time on community advocacy, expand their Ambassador program, and launch Dataiku Awards. They also plan to optimize the programs that they have in place and promote their newly-launched product ideation. Their longer-term vision is to deeply integrate their community content in the search and help functions in the Dataiku core product platform to make it even easier for customers to access the content they're looking for and to engage with other users.

Results

Dataiku started with an experienced team, a carefully planned strategy, and adequate resources to give their community an explosive start. In the first year, Dataiku logged 240k community visits — a 480% jump from the previous year — and they achieved more than $1 million in cost deflection savings. They also had an 82% accepted solutions rate.