Every conversation. One customer.

A new brand overnight, and a product to match.

DriveCentric (formerly DriveVelocity) rebranded overnight. With an existing user base, leadership wanted everything rethought, from the company’s identity to every web and mobile application. The challenge was to establish a new brand fast and carry it into one coherent product.

Brand first, then the application, feature by feature.

I started with market research: competitors, influencers and the target audience. Then the new brand identity: logo, color palette and design language. Then the application, feature by feature, with rapid prototypes and user validation.

• User interviews and feature prioritization sessions
• A new brand identity in green and purple, for renewal and creativity
• The Sales Pipeline dashboard for visual deal tracking
• The Customer Card: everything about a customer in one place
• The Conversation feature: every channel in one thread
• Vehicle Card for inventory, and DMS Linking to keep data in sync

The customer, the conversation and the deal in one place.

The application lacked visual consistency and clear paths. Salespeople struggled to follow customer conversations across channels, manage their pipeline and get to customer information quickly. The interface felt dated next to the technology underneath.

The Sales Pipeline gives a clear, linear view of deals moving through stages. The Customer Card opens a customer’s whole history without losing context. The Conversation tool brought every channel into one interface. Complex workflows take far less time.

What salespeople reported.

A salesperson’s day moved from several tools into one place, arranged around one customer. What follows is what shipped, what people said, and what the old figures can and cannot support.

What shipped

A new brand identity, and the application redesigned around it: the Sales Pipeline, the Customer Card, one Conversation thread for every channel, the Vehicle Card and DMS Linking.

What was observed

Salespeople reported working far more efficiently, and one conversation tool ended the juggling of separate channels.

What this case doesn’t claim

A measured efficiency gain. The figures below were reported at the time without a published baseline or method.

Reported at the time, method not published: customer lookup about five times faster; about 60% less switching between tools; about three times as many deals visible at once.

What we built in a short time.

DriveCentric will always hold a special place for me because of what we built in so short a time. I saw how an application could change the way a whole sales floor works. The platform keeps growing.