Markides Advisory
Use CaseUS Market Entry Strategy
CustomerB2B SaaS - 3D Configurator
& Digital Sales (Anonymized)
Selected examples of how we partner across growth, operations, and AI.
About these examples. These examples are illustrative. Some are drawn from prior work, some combine more than one engagement, and some were created to demonstrate how the work runs. Identifying details have been removed or changed, and some of this work predates Markides Advisory. What is real is the structure, the reasoning, and the format of the deliverables. Any figures shown are directional rather than audited.
02Current situation

Proof in one market, one category, and no map for where it went next.

Configurator-led selling had already worked commercially in Australia. That success is what made the next decision difficult.
2×
Lead generation in the Australian outdoor-kitchen and barbecue category, in the first year of configurator-led selling
1
Home market, one product category, sold through major retail-brand partners, the entire proof base
What the company is
An IT-led visualization and digital sales solution business combining 3D product configurators with systems integration and commercial workflow design, more than 20 years of 3D engineering depth behind it.
The uncomfortable part
Real, credible proof in one market created a harder problem than no proof at all: a material increase in new quotes and doubled lead generation, and no structured view of what to do with that proof next.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseCurrent situation
03The trigger

One growth question the founder could not answer with evidence.

With a funding round approaching and a growth-minded advisor newly on board, the direct question surfaced: where should the next dollar of growth investment go?
Path A
Go deeper in Australia
Expand within the proven home market and category.
|
Path B
Build new capability
Invest the next dollar into extending the product itself.
|
Path C
Enter a new geography
Take the proven capability outward into a new market.
Concern one, financial
Committing go-to-market spend to the wrong path before understanding where the technology actually mapped onto real buyer and business pain.
Concern two, reputational
A real risk of being read as a 3D rendering vendor rather than a strategic technology partner, which shapes which markets are even worth pursuing, and how the company has to be introduced to them.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseThe trigger
04Approach

Strong signal plus an unanswered direction question is a sprint pattern, not a study.

A short, fixed-scope commercial sprint was run ahead of any spend commitment.
Sprint mandate
Answer one question before any further go-to-market investment: grow next by building new product capability, by entering new verticals at home, or by expanding into a new geography, and if geography or vertical, which one.
The company had technology conviction and a genuine proof case. What it lacked was a structured, evidence-based way to compare candidate expansion paths against each other before spending against one.
Evidence gathered in the sprint
  • Founder interview, company history, the Australian proof case, and growth ambitions.
  • Sales and lead-generation data from the outdoor-kitchen work, reviewed directly.
  • Existing company materials, pitch decks, and technology documentation.
  • A structured comparison of candidate paths against actual capability, configurator plus systems integration, rather than against market size alone.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseEvaluation
05Evaluation

Each path was tested against capability fit, not market size.

The comparison was run against what the company could actually deliver, configurator plus systems integration, which is what separated a large market from a winnable one.
Candidate pathWhat the evidence showedJudgementVerdict
Expand further within Australia Same market, same category, same buyer set. The existing proof was already concentrated here. Unlikely to meaningfully grow market size, and unlikely to build the international credibility the company needed next. Deferred
Build new product capability Capability was already ahead of commercial reach: modular, rapidly updateable, business-ready systems built on 20+ years of 3D engineering. Premature. The constraint was not what the product could do, but where it had been proven to matter. Premature
Expand into a new geography and adjacent verticals Core capability generalizes anywhere buyers face complex, highly customizable products and a slow, manual, consultation-heavy sales process. The more urgent and answerable question: market and vertical fit for the product that already worked. Selected
Markides Advisory - Use CaseEvaluation
06The choice

Go outward before going deeper.

The capability generalizes to any category with strong product customization, high visual decision friction, and clear self-service upside. Find that category in a market worth winning, do not build more product for a market already proven.
Direction
Pursue U.S. market entry
The outward move, chosen over both deeper domestic expansion and new product development.
Anchor
Start in Texas
Chosen for practical reasons of buyer analogy and vendor fit rather than headline market size.
Target shape
Verticals analogous to outdoor kitchens
Strong product customization, high visual decision friction, clear self-service upside.
This recommendation became the mandate for the execution phase: clarify the company story, identify the best initial target markets, sharpen sales language, and reframe the offer from product demonstration to business value.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseChoice
07Execution, positioning

The offer was reframed from 3D rendering to digital sales engine.

The problem being solved was named on both sides: buyers cannot visualize, compare, or decide before speaking to sales; businesses absorb that as manual quoting work and poor lead qualification.
Read as
A 3D rendering vendor
Judged on visual output. Competes on price and polish. Hard to introduce into enterprise conversations at a strategic level.
Repositioned as
A technology partner building a new digital sales channel
Judged on friction removed, lead quality, and operational leverage. Software, integration, workflow design, and implementation support.
A fragmented capability set distilled into clearer pillars
Usability for non-technical teams Rapid setup Modularity Native CRM / ERP / inventory integration Reusability of assets and data across the journey Business impact, not visual output
Markides Advisory - Use CaseChoice
08Execution, market selection

Three U.S. verticals, each serving a different strategic role.

The U.S. market was broken into vertical choices rather than treated as one undifferentiated opportunity set.
VerticalWhy it qualifiedStrategic roleSequence
ADUs and backyard structures Products are inherently modular, buyers are often online-first, and the deployment path appeared shorter than the alternatives. Fastest pilot path First
Kitchen remodeling Strongest analogy to the Australian outdoor-kitchen proof case, with two entry vectors: standalone remodelers and builder-embedded kitchen solutions. Strongest proof-case adjacency Second
Custom and semi-custom homes Highest long-term strategic value, but slower sales cycles and higher credibility requirements before a vendor is taken seriously. Highest long-term value Later
Assessment criteria: market size · configurator fit · analogy to the Australian proof case · digital-sales-channel gap · speed-to-pilot feasibility.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseChoice
09Execution, entry logic

Regional builders, not national ones, and one pain point, not the full platform.

Why Texas, and which buyer
  • Analogous housing pain points and strong customization demand.
  • Local and regional builders over national-scale players, a more realistic vendor-to-customer fit, and sales friction that is actually actionable.
  • Named builder pain: poor communication, slow design finalization, limited transparency, budget ambiguity, inefficient back-and-forth between consultants and buyers.
The go-to-market shape
Open with
A single high-value pain point
How much time do teams lose because customers cannot visualize their options before an expensive, human-led sales conversation?
Then expand to
Digital sales channel and systems integration
Once initial interest is established, the conversation widens from point solution to platform.
Land at
Long-term technology partnership
Start narrow, prove measurable value, then grow into commercial and operational transformation.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseAction sequence
10Action sequence

The same sequencing logic, applied twice.

At portfolio level and again inside the U.S. market, the rule was the same: earn credibility in the faster category first, then spend it on the slower, larger one.
3
Candidate paths
Product capability, domestic depth, or new geography, compared against real capability fit.
→
1
Direction
Outward expansion: U.S. entry, anchored in Texas, in configurator-analogous verticals.
→
3
U.S. verticals
ADUs, kitchen remodeling, custom homes, assessed on the same fit-first criteria.
→
1
Proof point first
Earn a U.S. proof point in a faster-moving category, then use that credibility to enter the larger, slower ones.
Pricing model
Retainer for the core platform and maintenance, add-on fees for new modules or products, one-time fees for major integrations, modular, transparent, aligned to delivered value.
Delivery model
Work in sprints so value is demonstrated incrementally and reused as the relationship expands. Lower-friction entry, preserved path to account growth.
Proof handling
Use the Australian evidence as analogous validation while the strategy prioritizes finding an initial U.S. proof point that unlocks broader market access.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseAction sequence
11Outcomes

A directional call, then the work that carried it into practice.

The engagement ran as a commercial sprint followed by execution, working directly with the founder throughout.
Proof cited in the underlying materials
  • Australian outdoor-kitchen work with major retail brands: a material increase in new quotes and doubled lead generation in year one.
  • Meaningful after-hours engagement, supporting the argument that buyers want to explore and configure products outside standard operating hours.
What the engagement produced
  • Strategy decks, market-entry narratives, and pitch structures.
  • Solution framing, pricing philosophy, and go-to-market logic.
  • Transferable by design. The sequencing logic, the entry criteria, and the pricing model were documented, so the expansion could be run by the team rather than depending on the founder to drive each decision.
Nature of the outcome set
Not every outcome was an end-state commercial win. Much of the value was strategic assets that improved the company's clarity, direction, and ability to sell a broader story, the market-entry and go-to-market work is best read as validation of the sprint's early directional call.
Where the work sat
Category framing, market selection, commercial logic, product positioning, and practical sequencing, run with the founder throughout, from framing the sprint's growth question to leading the market-entry work that followed.
Markides Advisory - Use CaseOutcomes
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