Customer Success Story
How Certinia Operates as Customer Zero to Pioneer the AI-powered Services Lifecycle
At Certinia, being Customer Zero is not a marketing strategy, it is our primary operating model.
Summary
As "Customer Zero," Certinia runs its entire global business—from revenue forecasting and customer operations to core accounting—on the same native Salesforce platform it delivers to clients. By validating its Veda AI suite, professional services, and financial management tools internally, Certinia eliminated data silos, cut project kickoff times by 43%, and reduced monthly close cycles by over 50%. This internal-first approach gives clients concrete, real-world proof of an enterprise-tested platform.
Bio
Certinia is a global software company providing AI-powered Professional Services Automation (PSA) and enterprise management solutions.
Product
Industry
Customer Size
Large (1,000+ employees).
Results
Business Challenge
The Revenue Story: Turning Internal Wins into Scalable Proof Points
Chief Revenue Officer, John Tully, tackled a challenge common to global service providers: revenue forecasts trapped in spreadsheets, inconsistent proposal templates, and long delays between contract signature and project delivery.
By deploying Certinia Services Estimator internally, Certinia established an early validation point for standardized scoping and AI-assisted forecasting.
Quantifiable Outcomes & Operational Gains:
- Data-Backed Engagement Scoping: Engagement managers utilize standardized templates inside Salesforce, driving estimate-to-actual variance down to nearly zero.
- 43% Reduction in Kickoff Lag: Resources are identified during the sales cycle rather than post-signature, slashing kickoff delay and boosting immediate customer trust.
- Predictable Revenue Forecasting: Revenue forecasting occurs weekly within the platform, consistently maintaining a target variance within 5%.
- Veda AI Agent Insights: Certinia’s AI suite, Veda, introduces an intelligence layer directly over forecast data to surface risks, flag anomalies, and optimize pipeline management.
When you can forecast accurately, you can make proactive decisions about hiring, capacity, and investments. You stop being reactive to the business and start leading it.
The Solution for Certinia Customer Zero
Customer Operations: AI-Powered Orchestration & Agentic Workflows
Disjointed tools degrade customer trust. Chief Customer Officer, Todd Kisaberth, transitioned Certinia away from legacy, disparate platforms by bringing Certinia Professional Services (PS) Cloud and Customer Success (CS) Cloud together to work inside a single native Salesforce environment.
Certinia also embedded autonomous agents across internal workflows to build proof of concept in a live enterprise environment.
Quantifiable Outcomes & Operational Gains:
- 360-degree Customer Visibility: Customer Success Managers (CSMs) and Delivery teams share real-time visibility into support history, revenue models, and services status without data sync lag.
- Proactive Value Tracking: Customer health and value delivery targets are tracked continuously in CS Cloud, ensuring alignment from kickoff through renewal.
- Agentic AI in Action: Combining Veda AI with Salesforce Agentforce, autonomous agents trigger proactive health checks, draft success plans instantly upon deal close, and orchestrate renewal workflows at scale.
We're not trying to sync data across disparate systems—the data is already there, already trusted, already secure. Our team shows up to every customer conversation equipped with the full picture.
Impact
Core Accounting: Financial Truth & Eliminating Revenue Leakage
For Erin Sawyer, Chief Financial Officer, internal adoption is about verifying financial viability, auditability, and speed before bringing solutions to market. Operating global financial management on Certinia Financial Management Cloud directly links front-office execution with general ledger compliance.
Quantifiable Outcomes & Operational Gains:
- >50% Faster Financial Close: Direct ledger connectivity eliminates manual spreadsheet reconciliations and speeds monthly closing cycles.
- Zero Revenue Leakage: Connecting what is sold, delivered, and billed into one continuous system of record eliminates revenue leakage.
- Automated Compliance: Multi-element revenue recognition across subscription and milestone services is handled automatically with full auditability.
When I look at our numbers, I know they are accurate, auditable, and absolute. We aren't asking you to trust a product we hope works. We're asking you to trust a system that handles our own margins, our own compliance, and our own growth.
Run your services business with clarity, speed, and confidence
See how the Certinia PSA suite and Veda work together to connect your entire lifecycle—and make every step smarter.
