While working in U.S. government intelligence, Nisos’ founders recognized that the commercial sector lacked professionals with the caliber of intelligence skills needed to react to increasingly sophisticated security threats.
The challenge was clear: How could the team scale human-powered intelligence to an enterprise level? The answer: intelligence product offerings powered by cutting-edge technology and tradecraft — perfected and delivered by Nisos’ experienced analysts.
Today, Nisos functions as an extension of client security teams, providing managed intelligence with actionable data and insights to protect organizations and people from adversaries seeking to harm them.
In order to continue serving evolving client needs, Nisos introduced a new, streamlined product portfolio earlier this year.
“Our clients are very diverse, and the services we provide to our clients are inherently customized to their specific needs,” said Vice President of Product Marketing Nicki Doggart. “The goal of our new portfolio is to present our services in a manner that is clear, simple and accessible, as well as enhance seamless integration into our clients’ environments. The new portfolio makes it easier for clients to understand the breadth and depth of our capabilities, identify which services map to their needs and shorten the purchase process.”
Doggart and her team also found opportunities to bring additional clarity and transparency to product functionality.
“We applied the simplicity and accessibility approach to our service descriptions and value propositions,” she said. “We used plain language, removed jargon and were more succinct to improve understanding of both our capabilities and benefits to our clients.”
Throughout the product development process, Doggart found the team’s effectiveness and efficiency was supported and advanced by Nisos’ core values, rooted in trust, innovation, responsibility, diversity, and inclusion. Rather than encountering conflict as cross-functional teams worked to iterate and launch, she found a supportive and integrated approach to the work.
“Because of our value-based culture, we are collaborative by nature, we operate with mutual respect and we assume positive intent,” she said.
“Because of our value-based culture, we are collaborative by nature, we operate with mutual respect and we assume positive intent.”
Built In sat down with Doggart to learn more about what went into launching Nisos’ new portfolio of products and what sets the company apart from industry competitors.
What was your role within Nisos’ product relaunch?
As VP of product marketing, I closely collaborated with the product management team to craft bundled packaging that aligns to how clients manage risk and threats in their security programs, from risk assessment to threat monitoring and investigations. I also led the product marketing team in developing the new portfolio go-to-market strategy, messaging, content and enablement.
What obstacles did you encounter along the way? How did you successfully overcome them?
We faced multiple challenges bringing our new portfolio to market. This project inherently involved many team members across a variety of functions. As a startup we learned that we still had processes and frameworks to put in place similar to those in more mature enterprises. On top of that, given that we are a high-growth company, many of the team members — myself included — were relatively new to the company and were learning in real time about the organization and its systems.
To overcome these challenges, and with much support across the organization, I created and drove the company’s first formalized product launch program. This delivered immediate benefit to the project and the business as a whole. The entire team and all stakeholders had visibility into all of the many activities and deliverables required to bring the new portfolio to market, and their status. The team quickly became more aligned, efficient and motivated by seeing the project progress and milestones achieved.
What strategies did you employ to ensure that cross-functional collaboration went smoothly?
Nearly every department in the company contributed to developing and launching the new portfolio. Product management, engineering and our analyst teams worked together to define, scope and prepare to deliver the services. Finance team members helped shape our pricing and business modeling. Our business and revenue operations and legal teams ensured that the services were set-up in our systems and purchase processes.
In addition to collaborating with product management and creating a launch process, the product marketing team developed a launch plan to set up the sales teams for success and maximize the portfolio’s visibility externally. To keep all team members aligned and driving forward together, we rolled out the launch program, held regular meetings and provided frequent updates to stakeholders throughout the project.
How does Nisos compare to industry competitors when it comes to building and launching new products?
The Nisos team is faster, more effective and more collaborative than teams at many organizations with whom I’ve worked. Our urgency and pace are due to our mission — to help protect organizations and their people from those that seek to harm them. For many of us, the Nisos mission was a significant reason why we joined the company, contributes to our joy in our roles and drives us to strive to do our best every day.
