Nicolas Doise
Portrait of Nicolas Doise
Nicolas DoiseFor Kong's Senior Customer Success Manager role, France

Five years helping API customers adopt, expand and stay.

I manage the largest portfolio at Esendex France, a B2B messaging API platform: 40–50 enterprise and mid-market accounts, billed on usage with little contractual commitment. Retention is earned every month.

Net revenue retention above 100%, 8 at-risk strategic accounts retained, 30 accounts moving to a new API under my lead. Below, your job description answered line by line, with the evidence.

Read the answer to the role Message me on LinkedIn 

      
My profile as an API response. Pick a request.

    

  







  

    

      
Your job description, answered line by line.

      
Your posting says nobody checks every box. Here is where I stand on each line, with a status code and the evidence.

      

        
        

          200 OKDone, with results
          206 PartialDone, scope to extend
        

      

    


    
What you'll do

    
    
      
  • 200 OKSuccess plans covering use cases, roadmaps and outcomesAn account plan for each of my 15–20 strategic accounts: use cases by business unit, integration roadmap, next channels. The longest, with France's leading private hospital group, has run for five years and spans the patient journey.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKValue realizationAutomations tied to a number the customer already tracks, such as payments collected after an SMS reminder with a payment link. At Catalina, I proved campaign ROI to FMCG brands with shopper data, in two published case studies.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKNavigate complex organizationsThe CTO and the Head of Product are often two different people, with security, legal and finance around them. I map who decides, who uses and who blocks, and build contacts across business units.
    • 
      
  • 206 PartialLeverage partner ecosystemsCovered: accounts served through resellers and software vendors, where the partner opens the door to new teams and personas. Next: extend the same motion to cloud providers and systems integrators.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKData and analytics: utilization, leading indicators, Tableau, SFDC, Clari, HexDatadog for utilization trends, leading indicators and incident root cause. Power BI for revenue and margin per account, Tableau before it, Salesforce updated every week. Clari and Hex are new tools for the same discipline.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKQBRs and EBRs with an executive mindsetBusiness reviews with CTOs and Heads of Product, built on their usage data and their goals. On a usage-based model, value has to be proven long before renewal comes up.
    • 
      
  • 206 PartialCommand the platformCovered: I am the person my team asks about our API, authentication, webhooks, routing and complex setups. I wrote our API migration guide and troubleshoot integrations with customer engineers. Next: Kong's components, from day one. My first read of them is further down.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKRenewals and forecastingTwo major renegotiations in three years and a new contract on my largest account. Multi-year framework agreements signed. Forecast built from monthly usage, Salesforce updated every week.
    • 
    


    
What you'll bring

    
    
      
  • 200 OKGrit and determination8 at-risk strategic accounts retained since 2023, including after delivery incidents and a fraud case. Outside work: a 1:37 half marathon and 25 km trail races.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKCuriosityI was a recruiter first. Five to ten interviews a week taught me to ask the second and the third question. A drop in usage gets traced to a team, a route or a product change before any commercial talk.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKTeam-oriented mindsetNew colleagues come to me for the API, routing and tooling. I shared my migration guide with the team and ran the internal debrief of Meta's WhatsApp partner workshop.
    • 
      
  • 200 OKPrioritization40–50 accounts. The 15–20 that make 90%+ of revenue each get a plan. The others are served one-to-many, with guides, webinars and targeted emails. Migration, recovery and expansion run in parallel.
    • 
    

  







  

    

      
Results, each with its scope.

      
Esendex (Commify group) since February 2021, Catalina before. Client names and revenue amounts stay confidential.

    

    

      

        
Messages sent by my portfolio

        

          
150M+last 12 months

          
54.6M2020, the year before I took over

        

        
        
2020 volumeadded sinceOne dot is one million messages.

      

      

        
Net revenue retention, 2025

        
Above 100%

        
100%

        
Whole portfolio, no new logos counted. Existing customers grew more than the portfolio lost.

      

      

        
At-risk strategic accounts retained since 2023

        
8

        
        
Causes ranged from contract renegotiation to delivery incidents and fraud.

      

      

        
Accounts moving to the new API

        
30

        
        
In progress. I lead the migration and wrote the guide customers follow.

      

      

        
Ranking across Commify Europe, 2025

        

          

            
RevenueTop 3

            
            ?metric=revenue → rank ≤ 3
          

          

            
Gross marginTop 5

            
            ?metric=margin → rank ≤ 5
          

        

        
Commify group ranking of account owners across Europe.

      

      

        
Where the revenue sits

        

          
Strategic accounts, share of clients15–20 of 40–50

          
Their share of revenue90%+

        

        
This is why each strategic account gets its own plan.

      

      

        
Portfolio revenue at Catalina, 2018 to 2021

        
+92%

        
          
          0100200
          
          
          
          100192
          20182021
        
        
Indexed, 2018 = 100, start and end points only. Mostly by expanding existing accounts. Colgate-Palmolive and Kellogg's won back.

      

    

  







  

    

      
Adoption, expansion, risk: how I run each one.

      
The three outcomes your role is measured on, with what I watch and what I do.

    

    

      
        
        
        Every account
        one continuous loop
        Adoption
        Expansion
        Risk
      
      
Click a step to see how I run it.

    

    

      

        
Adoption

        
What I watch
  • Integration depth: API, webhooks, platform
  • Channels in use against channels available
  • Features bought and left unused

        
What I do
  • Walk developers through authentication, payloads and delivery receipts
  • Troubleshoot webhook and API errors with their engineers when needed
  • Answer InfoSec questionnaires for regulated customers

        
30 accounts moving to the new API, migration in progress.

      

      

        
Expansion

        
What I watch
  • Manual steps around messaging
  • New teams and use cases inside the account
  • Revenue and margin per account in Power BI

        
What I do
  • Scope automations with Professional Services
  • Tie the business case to a metric the customer already tracks
  • Grow existing accounts before chasing new logos

        
Net revenue retention above 100% in 2025.

      

      

        
Risk mitigation

        
What I watch
  • Volume and performance trends in Datadog
  • Delivery incidents and support load
  • Open compliance questions, changes of contact

        
What I do
  • Rank the portfolio by risk
  • Build one recovery plan with routing, support and legal
  • Renegotiate on usage data and service guarantees

        
8 at-risk strategic accounts retained since 2023.

      

    

  







  

    

      
Four cases, anonymized.

      
I can walk through each of them in an interview.

    

    

      

        
Risk mitigation and renewal

        
From at-risk account to primary provider

        

          
Context
European fintech inside a banking group. Regulated, demanding on security, contract up for renegotiation.

          
What I did
Tracked the risk signals early. Ran one plan with routing, legal and InfoSec. Handled the security and compliance reviews and renegotiated on service guarantees.

          
Result
Retained through two renegotiations in three years. In November 2026 the customer made us its primary provider.

        

      

      

        
Adoption at scale

        
Moving 30 accounts to a new API

        

          
Context
The old API has no end date. A migration costs developer time and shows no gain on day one, so the case has to rest on benefits.

          
What I did
Wrote the migration guide, since none existed. Prioritized accounts by integration depth and risk. Personal outreach, a customer webinar, and status tracked for leadership.

          
Status
In progress. The guide is in use by the first customers migrating, and colleagues reuse it with their own accounts.

        

      

      

        
Recovery after incidents

        
Keeping a customer whose messages cannot be late

        

          
Context
A customer sending time-critical alerts. In 2024, delivery incidents on its campaigns put the account at risk.

          
What I did
Found the cause with the routing team, then rebuilt trust with three things: service guarantees, a dedicated route and a dashboard made for them.

          
Result
Account retained, and still growing in 2026.

        

      

      

        
Expansion and value

        
Growing accounts by removing manual work

        

          
Context
Strategic accounts using messaging for one-off sends, with processes around it still run by hand.

          
What I did
Found the manual step, scoped an automation with Professional Services and priced it with a setup fee and a monthly fee.

          
Result
Sold and delivered: SMS satisfaction surveys for an insurer, payment reminders with a payment link for a hospital group, a mobile journey for a social services organization.

        

      

    

  







  

    

      
Why Kong, and my first read of the platform.

    

    

      
How do companies connect AI agents to their CRM, their data and their business rules while staying in control?

      

        
That question kept coming back at Meta's WhatsApp partner workshop in October. It is the problem Kong is solving, and the customer conversation I would like to have every day.

        
Below is how I would explain four of your components to a customer executive today. An outside-in read, to sharpen with your team.

      

    

    

      

        
ComponentIn plain wordsThe executive question it answersUsage signal I would watch

        
          
API GatewayOne policy layer in front of every API: authentication, rate limits, traffic rules.How fast can a team ship a new API without a new security debate each time?Services and routes onboarded, team by team

          
Dedicated Cloud GatewaysKong runs the gateways on single-tenant infrastructure in AWS or Azure, patches and upgrades included.Why are our platform engineers still operating gateways?Share of traffic on managed versus self-hosted nodes

          
AI GatewayThe same control for LLM, MCP and agent-to-agent traffic: who calls which model, behind which guardrails, at what token cost.What does AI cost us per team, and what data leaves the company?AI share of traffic, token spend per team

          
Mesh ManagerEncryption, identity and visibility between services, managed from Konnect.Can we reach zero trust without every team rebuilding it?Zones and services running in the mesh

        
      

    

    
Based on Kong's public product pages, November 2026.


    

      

        
200 OKWhat transfers from messaging APIs

        
  • An API-first product bought by technical teams and renewed by executives
  • Usage-based revenue, where adoption is the forecast
  • Security and compliance reviews with regulated customers, including a banking group
  • Integration and migration projects with customer developers
  • Multi-year framework agreements negotiated with executives

      

      

        
202 AcceptedMy ramp, already planned

        
  • Kong Gateway, Konnect and Mesh, with the cloud-native context they run in, through Kong Academy and the Gateway certification
  • A partner motion with cloud providers and integrators

      

    

  







  

    

      
A success plan for my first 90 days.

      
Written the way I would write one for a customer: actions, then how we both know it is done.

    

    
    
      
  1. 
        
    Days 1 to 30
    
        
    Learn
    
        
    • Kong Academy courses on Gateway and Konnect, with the Gateway certification as target
    • My own lab on Konnect: one API and one LLM behind a gateway
    • Read the history of every account in my book, shadow customer calls
    
        
    Done whenI can demo the platform and explain each component without slides.
    
      
    2. 
      
  2. 
        
    Days 31 to 60
    
        
    Own
    
        
    • A success plan and a stakeholder map for each account
    • A health baseline from utilization metrics and leading indicators
    • First business reviews with customer executives
    
        
    Done whenEvery account has a plan, a map and a next review date.
    
      
    3. 
      
  3. 
        
    Days 61 to 90
    
        
    Grow
    
        
    • Renewal timelines validated with the account team
    • One expansion hypothesis per account, tested with the customer
    • One playbook shared with the team
    
        
    Done whenMy forecast in Salesforce can be defended line by line.
    
      
    4. 
    

  







  

    

      
Background, and what each step left me with.

    

    
    
      
  1. 2021 to todayCustomer Success Manager, strategic accounts · Esendex (Commify group) · job title: Key Account ManagerFrance, remote. Messaging APIs for 40–50 B2B customers: SMS, RCS, WhatsApp. Where I learned to work with developers and executives in the same account.
    2. 
      
  2. 2018 – 2021Key Account Manager · Catalina MarketingShopper-data campaigns for FMCG brands. Where I learned to prove value with the customer's own numbers.
    3. 
      
  3. 2017 – 2018Account Manager · TRNDWord-of-mouth and community programs for brands. Where I learned to sell a platform, not a campaign.
    4. 
      
  4. 2016 – 2017Digital recruitment consultant · Page PersonnelFull-cycle recruitment of digital and data profiles. Where I learned to interview and to listen.
    5. 
      
  5. EarlierGuest Relations · Walt Disney WorldWhere customer obsession started. Then SKEMA Business School, master's in international marketing, 2014.
    6. 
    

    
    
      
  • FR · EN · ESFrench native, English bilingual, Spanish conversational
    • 
      
  • 1:37Half marathon. I also run 25 km trails.
    • 
      
  • 300+Roller coasters ridden
    • 
      
  • 1Video game shipped, built on PICO-8. Plus a gaming podcast I co-hosted.
    • 
    

  







  

    
POST /interviews201 Created

    
The next request is yours.

    
Every figure on this page is real and scoped, and I can walk through each one. LinkedIn is the quickest way to reach me. France, remote.

    Message me on LinkedIn