Pippa builds a successful podcast platform with the help of Intercom

Pippa is at the forefront of the nascent, yet rapidly growing content medium - podcasting. Offering an all-inclusive platform for podcasters and advertisers, they’re building a fully featured podcast publishing platform with dynamic ads insertion. As podcasting continues to rise in popularity, Pippa is starting to hit its stride at just the right time.

From the beginning

Pippa built its company around the notion that the podcast space is a greenfield for innovation. Today’s podcasts include static ads that don’t update to their listeners’ geography, demographics, or time of listening. Co-founder and CTO Erwan Jegouzo says “Imagine watching an episode of Seinfeld today and seeing ads from the 1990’s.” Pippa’s on a mission to bring podcasting into today’s ad economy - however even the best companies with the best ideas, solving real problems can fall flat when released to the market. Erwan knew that without instant feedback from their early adopters - they could build a product that wasn’t the right market fit.

A Techstars alum, Pippa came to Intercom via the Intercom for Early Stage Partner Program where eligible companies associated with one of our 80+ partners can access Intercom’s suite of products at a discounted price. Intercom has been ingrained in Pippa’s customer communications since Pippa’s inception and has acted as the pulse of the product - providing an open communication channel between Pippa and their budding customer base.

Integrated at every step

From helping prospects get started, to onboarding new customers and supporting loyal users. Erwan said, “Giving prospects and customers a way to reach out to us on our marketing site via the Intercom Messenger has tremendously increased our sign up rates.” The ability to jump in and answer questions about the product or pricing gives prospects the right level of confidence to get started.

Once a prospect signs up, Pippa uses Messages to send auto messages for onboarding and retention. These targeted auto messages address everything from uploading your first podcast, to reaching out to users who haven’t logged in awhile.

“We have a total of 10 live auto messages with an average of 78% open rate. Our messages are sent from Abby, and users frequently respond [to Abby] because they are personal and they love that there’s a face and name behind the software.”

Intuitive and effortless

Pippa recognizes at this stage of their company the key to success is staying close to customers, hearing their needs and providing them with high-quality support. “If we want to build a product our customers will love, we have to provide them with a communication channel that is intuitive and effortless.” explains Erwan. Pippa also has the Intercom Messenger enabled for logged in customers so they can reach out to ask for help or provide feedback. The Pippa team collaborates in the inbox to provide real time support. To reduce the number of inbound conversations they need to respond to, they’ve also published 14 articles in their public help center.

Erwan proudly exclaims, “Our help articles total around 1,000 views to date, and have drastically reduced the time the team has to spend answering the same repeated questions - and allows us to focus on building our product instead.”

As Intercom has become the defacto channel for customer communication, Pippa has seen engagement rates skyrocket. “About 1 month ago, we made a big improvement to our data pipeline. We messaged our customers to let them know about how this change would impact them. 98% of our active users opened the message, 10% of them read our technical Medium article and a few customers engaged with us directly,” said Jegouzo validating how important it is for their customers to have a personal communication experience.

The future together

As Pippa continues to grow, they’ll continue to integrate Intercom across its platform and expand communication to their advertisers as well. Erwan credits Intercom for bringing personal customer communication to their company - and building strong relationships between their users and Pippa. Erwan exclaims, “I’m recommending Intercom to every new startup I get the chance to talk to!”