Barely a year and a half after the introduction of Tikkie, more than two million Dutch people are gratefully using the product. Time to conquer the German market! On behalf of Moneyou (100% subsidiary of ABN AMRO), GlobalOrange supported the development of a German variant and new Dutch update of the platform with a dedicated team. More than 10 billion euros in payments were handled in Tikkie’s first 5 years!

Kannst du mir einen Tikkie schicken?

CHALLENGE

How do we make sure that Tikkie is ready to storm the German market within a few months and is also completely up to date technologically?

APPROACH

GlobalOrange revamped the architecture, modernised the technologies used and made the application multilingual. In addition, much attention was paid to the usability of the app and web application.

RESULT

  • Connection to more than 3,000 German banks.
  • Increased scalability and better maintainability make the Tikkie platform future-proof.
  • The technology developed by GlobalOrange is now being used for the Dutch version of the popular platform.
  • Tikkie now has more than seven million users. On some days, >300,000 Tikkies are sent.
  • Update: In Germany, Tikkie has not been a success, our eastern neighbours still prefer “Bar money”, cash to pay for drinks.
Tikkie

Super-fast and simple settlement

Dinners, nights at the pub or buying festival tickets. All these activities end with sending a Tikkie. Tikkie is a free app available for both iOS and Android. The platform is an initiative of ABN AMRO but is also accessible to customers of other banks. With Tikkie, you can easily send payment requests to friends and family via WhatsApp or a Messenger. Payment is made via iDEAL and your own bank. Tikkie can be used by anyone with a Dutch current account and a suitable smartphone. The recipient of a payment request does not need to have the app himself. Convenience serves man. Better said, this convenience serves more than two million people. Tikkie gathered a huge group of users around it within eighteen months. Meanwhile, trials are also being conducted to introduce the app into business payments. Among others, Transavia, Hello Fresh, Ajax and Warchild are participating in tests. Tikkie could replace existing payment methods such as debit cards, PayPal and credit cards. It is already possible to pay for a healthy juice in Amsterdam using the app.

Tikkie over GlobalOrange

Gabi Helfenstein (Tikkie/Moneyou):

“The success of Tikkie in the Netherlands is largely explained by the ease of use and speed of the product combined with the familiar iDeal. Retrieving money is easy and also easy to keep track of. In addition, paying a Tikkie by means of GIF (short and repetitive animations) is designed in a funny way so that asking for money back becomes a less embarrassing exercise than it usually is.

We built the German version of Tikkie together with developers from GlobalOrange during a 100-day challenge. In our office hung a, now infamous, tear-off calendar. Every day counted. We more than met this ambitious deadline as a team.

In the end, it took us 67 effective working days to get Tikkie into the German App store.

A colleague of mine recommended GlobalOrange as a partner to realise this project. GlobalOrange’s flexibility ensured that we could start the project quickly. The developers from GlobalOrange were part of the team in no time and that is reflected in the result. The people at GlobalOrange are open, direct and committed. The same can be said about communication, open and clear. I experienced the quality of the people from GlobalOrange as particularly high and we are happy to continue the cooperation.

 

 

 

Together with GlobalOrange, we refactored Tikkie’s codebase, made it ready for localisation and made it highly scalable. We also worked with other experts to ensure that Tikkie runs on Amazon’s AWS. This new version of Tikkie is future-ready and can grow without significantly increasing variable costs.

We see the German version of Tikkie as a communication tool for the German market. The name Moneyou is still quite unknown in we think we can work on our brand with this App. With Tikkie.de, we show ease of use, fun, speed and security.

We believe that a best-of-breed solution is needed to achieve the best result. Important to know is that we are independent in our choice of partners and suppliers, so we can always choose the best solution for your business.

This is exactly why we implemented Tikkie.de on Amazon Web Services or AWS. The right infrastructure is, so to speak, the foundation for a successful platform. With our independent partners, we can offer a stable, secure and above all flexible basis for your platform.”

Developer about the case

Front-end developer Daniel Ionescu:

“The goal of this project was clear: to offer German users the same simple and fast repayment functionality as Tikkie does in the Netherlands. However, the German banking infrastructure is significantly different from that in the Netherlands. Whereas the Dutch product works with iDeal and only needs to communicate with a small dozen banks, the German variant needs to work with more than 3,000 banks. These banks all use their own API and all need to be integrated into a transaction flow. Moneyou managed to achieve this by working with German company FintecSystems. This party provides a component that facilitates payments based on the user’s bank.

A total of five people from GlobalOrange worked with Moneyou on Tikkie Germany. We felt right at home, the cooperation was more than smooth because of constant and open communication. There was strong synergy. Of course there was time pressure, but we met all our sprint goals relatively easily without having to make any concessions.”

 

 

Together with the Moneyou and Tikkie NL team, we constantly realised usable products. As a result, we more than met our 100-day challenge and therefore had extra time to test the final product.

Among other things, we refactored the current product, and emigrated the product to Amazon Web Services. Amazon provides a perfect platform for developing and maintaining digital products. The great advantage of AWS is that we can add features to a product in a fast and stable way. This way, we build a quality product. The system tests changes fully automatically and implements changes sometimes within 20 minutes.

We also developed a new marketing website to meet the demands of the German market.

Tikkie

A practical guide to answering important questions, this New York Times Bestseller is a book for teams of all sizes, from small startups to Fortune 100s, from teachers to nonprofit organizations.

Entrepreneurs and leaders face big questions every day: What is the most important place to set up and how do you start? What does your idea look like in real life? How many meetings and discussions does it take before you are sure you have the right solution?

The Design Sprint allows you to start answering these questions. Jake Knapp created the five-day process at Google, where sprints were used for everything from Google Search to Google X. He joined Braden Kowitz and John Zeratsky at Google Ventures and together they have completed more than two hundred sprints with startups in enterprise, e-commerce, healthcare, finance, climate, artificial intelligence and more.

Tikkie

Creating a new product? You need to ascertain: What issue does it solve for customers? How does it align with your business goals? This is key for crafting a successful product that fulfills both customer needs and business objectives.

This is where the Product Discovery framework comes in handy.

We are giving away our €5k SaaS Product Discovery framework!

We worked to perfect our framework for years. What it will help you:

1. Expose user pain points
2. Uncover product opportunities
3. Create a roadmap for development

… in just 5 steps that you can execute with your team.

It helped our client GXO Logistics build the right product from the start. This led to a ROI of 100% within 3 months.

Want this framework? Fill out the form below and you will receive the framework directly in your mail.

Tikkie

I would like to receive the Product Discovery framework:

Product Discovery workshop

Besides the Product Discovery framework, it’s also smart to start with a Product Discovery Workshop. It sets up the base for a great product that people want. The starting point for every new project at GlobalOrange is a two-day Product Discovery Workshop. Together with our experts in User Experience Design, Product Management and Technology, your vision and goals are mapped out as clearly as possible and related to the ‘unmet needs’ of the end users.

This workshop is an excellent way to start building the right product. The workshop can usually be scheduled within 2 weeks and takes place with us at the Posthoornkerk in Amsterdam or at your location.

Tikkie

Interesting articles, books and podcasts about Product Discovery

  • Book recommendation
    Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days
    Tikkie
    Read more
  • Download
    Download: Product Discovery framework
    Tikkie
    Read more
  • Podcast recommendation
    Product Bakery: The Product Discovery 101
    Tikkie
    Read more
  • Book recommendation
    Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value
    Tikkie
    Read more

As an early-stage founder you have one goal: find product-market fit. On The Product Market Fit Show, they explore the 0 to 1 journeys of the most successful startups. They go deep and provide detailed examples you can steal. The goal is simple: understand product-market fit better than anyone on the planet.

In this podcast, Design Manager Alex Dapunt and Product Coach Christian Strunk meet with people from all corners of product development to talk about how to build great products that customers really appreciate. They discuss everything from Product Management to Design to Development to Marketing. The goal? To break down the traditional boundaries between these functions and foster an open conversation among all these teams.

In episode “#111 The Product Discovery 101,” Alex talks about how he does product discovery and how he and his team managed to establish a new process within their company.

Creating a new product? You need to know: What issue does it solve for customers? How does it fit with your business goals? This is key for a successful product that meets both customer needs and business plans.

A smart way to start is with a Product Discovery Workshop. It sets up the base for a great product that people want.

Product Discovery workshop

The starting point for every new project at GlobalOrange is a two-day Product Discovery Workshop. Together with our experts in User Experience Design, Product Management and Technology, your vision and goals are mapped out as clearly as possible and related to the ‘unmet needs’ of the end users.

This workshop is an excellent way to start building the right product. It allows us to determine the product-market fit and start immediately in that direction. Once the workshop is complete, you will receive a project plan that describes how we can build your product the right way together. All three disciplines (Product Management, UX, Technology) will be involved in the workshop from GlobalOrange.

Tikkie

Tikkie

What you get

  • Product Vision, Persona’s, Stakeholder map
  • Product Roadmap
  • One or two User Journeys
  • High-level Architecture
  • Project Plan – approach, governance, risks, schedule

The Product Discovery Workshop requires an investment of EUR 5k and two days of your time. The workshop can usually be scheduled within 2 weeks and takes place with us at the Posthoornkerk in Amsterdam or at your location. Directly after the workshop we can start developing the software.

Make an appointment below to discuss or schedule the workshop.
We are looking forward to it!

Make an appointment to discuss the Product Discovery workshop

Lay the foundation for a valuable and successful product that people really like.

Get in touch and we’ll look at the possibilities together!

Interesting articles, books and podcasts about Product Discovery

  • Book recommendation
    Sprint: How to Solve Big Problems and Test New Ideas in Just Five Days
    Tikkie
    Read more
  • Download
    Download: Product Discovery framework
    Tikkie
    Read more
  • Podcast recommendation
    Product Bakery: The Product Discovery 101
    Tikkie
    Read more
  • Book recommendation
    Continuous Discovery Habits: Discover Products that Create Customer Value and Business Value
    Tikkie
    Read more

“There is a close cooperation. The great thing about GlobalOrange is that they also see our goal as their own. They are really committed to what you want to achieve together.”

Tikkie
Ernst van Apeldoorn
Product Owner SDB groep

Introduction to Continuous Product Discovery | Paweł Huryn

In the video below, Product Coach Paweł Huryn explains why Product Discovery is so important and elaborates on the terms ‘Design Thinking’ and ‘Continuous Product Discovery’.

How do you know that you are making a product or service that your customers want? How do you ensure that you are improving it over time? How do you guarantee that your team is creating value for your customers in a way that creates value for your business?

In this book, you’ll learn a structured and sustainable approach to continuous discovery that will help you answer each of these questions, giving you the confidence to act while also preparing you to be wrong. You’ll learn to balance action with doubt so that you can get started without being blindsided by what you don’t get right.

If you want to discover products that customers love-that also deliver business results-this book is for you.

Tikkie

Guy Raz interviews the world’s best-known entrepreneurs to learn how they built their iconic brands. In each episode, founders share intimate moments of doubt and failure, and insights on their eventual success.

How I Built This doesn’t tell the typical success stories. This business podcast showcases how even the most successful founders face dark and difficult moments.The show is a testament to the value of pushing through challenges, , because building something big and impactful is worth it.

Guy Raz is a writer, journalist and an award-winning podcaster who has been described by The New York Times as “one of the most popular podcast hosts in history.” In total, Raz’s podcasts are heard by almost 19 million listeners per month.

Tikkie

“Companies without a defined pricing strategy generate 10% less revenue per user than those with well-structured pricing models.”

(Gartner)

We talked to Johan Maessen and asked him how to prevent pricing debt and maximise profit through pricing strategy. You will find the Q&A in this article. If you prefer to read the questions in a carousel, click here for the LinkedIn post.

Do you have any questions or do you want to discuss pricing strategy for your product or platform? Plan a 20 min discovery call with our CEO, Yvo Gortemaker. He is happy to share his insides and to provide his feedback!

Tikkie

Tikkie

Q&A

Q: Why do SaaS companies need a pricing strategy?

A: “The game has three components: acquiring customers, monetising and retaining them. Initially, growth was enough, especially during COVID. Now, as growth slows, it’s crucial to profit from existing customers. Pricing strategy is key for growth and even more so when growth stalls. It’s the easiest way to boost profitability. If growth remains low, this becomes increasingly important.”

Q: Where do you start with a pricing strategy?

A: “Pricing isn’t a one-time thing; it’s ongoing. It’s like looking after something—you need to keep at it for the best results. Doing a pricing exercise once helps, but continuous attention is key for lasting impact. First, find who’s in charge of pricing in your team. If nobody really owns it, appoint someone. That’s a good starting point.”

Q: What's the price of a SaaS product based on?

A: “In economics, pricing has three main ways. First, ‘cost plus,’ where you add a margin to your costs. Second, you see where your competitors are and determine your desired positioning. The third is ‘value-driven,’ focusing on what customers find valuable. Good pricing combines these methods, not just one.”

Q: How to come up with a good pricing model?

A: “My model follows six steps to set service charges, but the key is to align on the client’s business model. For example, Michelin realised their tire sales didn’t match their customers’ mileage-based charges. Changing to a kilometer-based pricing improved their service. Aligning your pricing with your customers’ needs is key.”

Q: What factors influence the price?

A: “Cost, competition, and your desired position matter. Other factors like market conditions and your strategy count too. If you aim for quick market share, your pricing strategy differs from targeting high-end customers. Eventually, a lot of different factors come together in your pricing and that’s exactly what makes it my favourite domain!”

“Your pricing plan should grow with your business, adapting to changes and receiving regular attention for ongoing improvements, even if not daily.”

(Johan Maessen)

Q: When do you actually start thinking about pricing?

A: “Many companies make a mistake by creating a product first and then thinking about its price. It’s better to consider the price even before starting to make the product. This helps prioritise what you build. For instance, companies like Philips analyse market data and competitor pricing before creating new products, thinking about prices early on to make better choices.”

Q: What would you charge when the product still is incomplete?

A: “I wouldn’t charge for something unfinished. It’s like buying half a product for the full price, which doesn’t seem fair to customers.
Instead, I’d let the price grow as the value of the product grows, maybe starting lower to attract more customers initially.”

Q: What is the impact of bad pricing?

A: “Bad pricing affects every part of your business: getting new customers, selling more to current ones, and keeping them happy in general. If your prices aren’t right, your business might not make enough money to grow and improve. The key to a successful business is making a profit to invest in giving customers more value. Bad pricing risks leaving you with no money to create more value for your customers in the future.”

Q: How do you make your pricing model scalable?

A: “If you offer different packages, you give customers choices and room for changes later. This makes it easier to add new features to specific packages, making your business more adaptable. Connecting this approach to your customers’ business model helps your business grow with them, ensuring scalability.”

Value is like love. You feel it when you have it, and you know when you don’t.”

(Marcos Rivera, ‘Street Pricing’)

Johan Maessen: “The quote by Marcos Rivera is a strong metaphor for business pricing. Companies getting it right likely understand how to set prices, while those struggling probably recognise they’re off track. But like love, finding the right value and associated price can be challenging to discover when looked for.”

Tikkie

Q: How can companies communicate significant price increases without losing customers?

A: “Announce price changes early, like in October for January 1, to reduce impact. Establish periodic price changes to help customers adjust. This minimises churn and allows for smaller, manageable adjustments over time.”

Q: How do you avoid pricing too low and getting priced out of the market?

A: “Adjust prices carefully by regularly reviewing costs, competition, and customer perception to avoid undervaluing. Plan small price increases over time. Avoid sudden jumps that might push your customers away. Big price changes can catch them off guard and create dissatisfaction.”

Q: How can you persuade customers to switch to more expensive packages effectively?

A: “Begin with differentiation. Know your customers well and provide tailored packages. This gives choices and guides them automatically towards pricier options. Offer a clear structure and ongoing options, highlighting extra services.”

Q: Is it possible to have multiple price points?

A: “Yes, best practice even, I would say. Fencing, by which different price points are linked to a certain number of users or services, is a smart way to steer customers into different packages while controlling costs.”

Q: How do you handle pricing privately yourself?

A: “I usually set an 80% threshold to avoid over analysing every purchase decision and consider myself thereby an ideal prey for many companies. The other 20%, especially when bothered, I seek understanding and transparency. Recently, a large company’s unclear discount policies left me feeling misled and frustrated. Discovering others shared my doubts confirmed my concerns.”

Q: What if customers threaten to cancel, stay on old plans without new features at the same prices?

A: “No, Ignoring this makes managing different propositions and prices hard. It’s not a long-term solution. Always provide options for
customers to switch to newer proposals, offering a temporarily discount before shifting entirely to the new rate.”

“In small startups without a pricing team, having one person responsible for deciding between low prices with high volume or premium prices can already significantly impact the overall strategy.”

(Johan Maessen)

Do you have questions or want to brainstorm with us? We are here for you! Leave your details and we’ll get back to you as soon as possible.

A brand name is more than just a word; it is the first impression, the initial connection between a business and its potential customers. That’s where Aesop comes in.

Aesop is a verbal identity storytelling agency co-founded by Tanya Gustafson and Andrew Macken. The platform offers small business access to high-quality naming solutions at an accessible price point. In their quest for software development assistance, Aesop encountered GlobalOrange, recommended by a friend. Tanya Gustafson remarked, “GlobalOrange turned out to be a perfect solution for us and our set of circumstances.”

 

Curious about how this partnership started? Want to know our approach and how it benefits your business? Book a call with Guido; he’ll fill you in on all the details:

CHALLENGE

GlobalOrange and Aesop faced a joint challenge to build a well-designed SaaS platform to provide SMBs (small and medium-sized businesses) with affordable access to professional naming solutions.

APPROACH

Aesop and GlobalOrange shared a common goal: to create a user-friendly, accessible, and delightful SaaS solution that would approach the advice a human brand naming expert would give. They achieved this by a close collaboration with our team of multidisciplinary experts, including an AI specialist to model human naming expertise.

RESULT

  • Human naming expertise modelled into a high quality AI algorithm
  • The Aesop platform provides smaller businesses professional guidance in naming their brand.
  • A faster and more approachable, enjoyable, and affordable brand naming process.

Human naming expertise modelled into a smart algorithm

Aesop started with an idea by Tanya Gustafson. She has been working as a verbal identity specialist and brand strategist for nearly two decades. She saw a big problem: it was hard for small businesses to find good names without spending too much money or time. Tanya learned from talking to many clients that naming things can be fun but also really hard. There are lots of languages and finding the perfect words is tough. That’s where Aesop comes in. It wants to help people find great names by using a smart tool. This tool is like having an expert with you, making naming easier and more enjoyable. Aesop uses a computer program that acts like a human expert. This means it can help people all over the world and it costs much less than traditional agencies.

“Working with Global Orange was very refreshing. Everyone was an elite talent but also a really great person to spend time with. We enjoyed every minute.”

Tikkie
Tanya Gustafson
Founder and CEO of Aesop

Unique features of Aesop

1. The (structured) discovery journey

Aesop acts as someone’s own mini professional led ideation session. For instance, give 10 words that are related to your offerings, which provokes people to think about their offering in a different way they had not done before. They will think across different dimensions; functional, emotional, and experiential. During this phase, you will align with all features of the company, which may seem like something that happens just throughout the course of creating a business, but that is not always the case.

 

 

2. Algorithm

Aesop has taken generative AI and employed it in a very powerful way to help with things like hyperfocus and strategic language mining. This is used as an input into a broader proprietary algorithm that is designed that encodes the processes of a human naming expert into software. The names are created as a result of software that mimics what a human brain does as a professional when you’re searching for and identifying the best named candidates for a given offer.

Tikkie

Tikkie

Why was the name Aesop chosen?

Tanya Gustafson says, “Aesop is like an ancient fable. By choosing the name Aesop, we wanted to emphasise that we really value human imagination and the power of human storytelling in our work. It is not just a machine or technology. Instead, it is a result of human expertise and human vision. By adopting the name Aesop, we want to show that we care about using technology together with human creativity, not solely relying on the power of technology.”

“Learning about the importance of a great name was an eye-opening journey. Shaping a platform that encapsulated Tanya’s creativity and addressing the pain points in the naming process was challenging, yet exciting. The amazing quality of the output, a result of the incredible power of AI and the algorithm that we have developed, is impressive.”

Tikkie
Wiard
Product Manager GlobalOrange

The collaboration in 3 words

Tikkie

Success factors

The Aesop platform has recently launched, but it is already collected feedback from potential users who have navigated through the user experience. The feedback has been quite positive, with valuable suggestions for making minor adjustments to enhance the UX and simplify the discovery journey and its related outputs. Through early user testing, some new feature ideas emerged that had not been previously considered. In the future, Aesop aims to educate people about the importance and power of naming, as well as how to use it effectively. Naming is a fundamental requirement for every business, product, and even newsletters – it is a universal need in any type of economy.

Tikkie

Tikkie

The collaboration with GlobalOrange

We came across GlobalOrange through a referral from a friend and his colleagues who had worked with GlobalOrange beforehand and made the recommendation and also the initial introduction. Our friend already did the diligence process comparing you to all of your competitors. We put our trust in the hands of our friend. And that turned out great! The collaboration with GlobalOrange was a variety of project management to development, front end, back end, and even UX and UI, which has been perfect for our needs. Even though we are not geographically in the same place, it definitely feels like were a close team, which we value greatly. Andrew Macken said, “GlobalOrange turned out to be a perfect solution for us and our set circumstances.”