Customer Success Platforms (CSPs) can be a game-changer—or a total headache. For small companies, they often turn into expensive shelfware, bogging teams down before they’re ready. For larger businesses managing hundreds of accounts, they’re indispensable. So when’s the right time to invest in a CSP?
That’s exactly why we acquired Staircase AI. Too many companies jump into a CSP before they’re ready, struggling under complex workflows when they just need to get a handle on customer risk. The reality? Risk doesn’t wait. By the time companies realize they need a CSP, it’s too late—customers have already started walking out the door.
Building an AI-powered customer intelligence platform isn’t something you hack together overnight. It took the Staircase AI team three and a half years to perfect, with a vision that never wavered: deliver powerful customer insights without burdening teams with extra work. And beyond the tech itself, Staircase AI stands apart because of the core product principles that make it a must-have in today’s SaaS world.
The first time Revenue and CS leaders see it in action, the reaction is almost always:
👉 Wait… HOW did it know that?
👉 OMG, I need this.
👉 I can’t imagine running my team without it.
So what makes it so jaw-droppingly essential? In this blog, we’ll take you behind the scenes of how co-founders Ori Entis and Lior Harel built Staircase AI and the few core principles they had in mind:
Zero User Input: AI That Works for You
From day one, Staircase AI was built on a non-negotiable principle: zero user input. Because the moment you ask teams to manually log interactions or input data? Adoption plummets.
Instead, Staircase AI runs quietly in the background, automatically analyzing customer interactions across emails, meetings, and support tickets. No extra steps. No behavior changes. Just real-time intelligence, effortlessly.
The result? A customer intelligence platform that captures the complete picture of how customers use a product and how they engage, communicate, and make decisions.
Instant Value: Insights on Day One
Speed matters. Staircase AI eliminates the long onboarding cycles and heavy manual data entry that plague many customer intelligence tools. Every unanswered risk signal could be another customer lost.
Instead of waiting weeks (or even months) to realize value, Staircase AI gets to work as soon as you connect it. By integrating directly with communication channels like email, Slack, CRM, and more, it instantly surfaces risks, opportunities, and patterns hidden in customer interactions.
This frictionless approach mirrors what’s happening in customer support, where self-service tools are transforming efficiency. Discover how automation is reshaping customer interactions in our blog: Cost-Effective Customer Support: How Self-Service Reduces Operational Costs.
Work Where You Already Are
Nobody wants another tool cluttering their workflow. That’s why Staircase AI doesn’t force users into yet another dashboard. It delivers insights where you already work.
Whether your team lives in Slack, email, your CRM, or a CSP like Gainsight, Staircase AI meets them there. No extra logins. No new dashboards to check.
Your benefit: No change management headaches means you can maximize adoption and minimize disruption, ensuring teams actually use the incoming customer intel.
Security & Ethical AI: Built Right from the Start
AI that operates with zero input and delivers real-time insights? It has to be secure.
Staircase AI prioritized security, privacy, and ethical AI from day one. The team pursued SOC 2 compliance before hiring its first engineer, embedding security into its foundation rather than treating it as an afterthought. Here’s how Staircase AI ensures security, fairness, and compliance at every level:
- AI models are trained on carefully curated data for accuracy & fairness.
- All communication data is rigorously cleaned and filtered, removing disclaimers, automated messages, and irrelevant content.
- Staircase AI analyzes customer sentiment and engagement while respecting user privacy, making it a trusted solution for companies navigating the AI era.
And now, we’re taking it even further.
At Gainsight, we know that security is something you need to invest in and improve continuously. We’re thrilled to announce that Staircase AI has achieved the ISO/IEC 42001 certification, the first international standard for Artificial Intelligence (AI) Management Systems.
ISO/IEC 42001 sets a global benchmark for responsible AI governance, ensuring fairness, transparency, and risk management. This certification reinforces Gainsight’s commitment to developing AI solutions that businesses can trust—secure, ethical, and built for long-term success.
The reality: Every SaaS company sits on a goldmine of customer interactions. But without a structured approach to AI governance, those insights can introduce more risk than reward. ISO 42001 ensures AI operates transparently and responsibly, turning uncertainty into confidence. With this certification, Staircase AI delivers intelligence with built-in guardrails, protecting both companies and their customers.
Built for Trust, Speed, and Actionable Insights
Without adding complexity, Staircase AI eliminates blind spots, cuts manual effort, and surfaces real-time customer insights by staying true to its founding principles:
- Zero input: Adoption stays high.
- Instant value: Impact is immediate.
- Seamless integration: Teams don’t have to change how they work.
- Security-first AI: Businesses can trust the insights they rely on.
Staircase AI is also SOC 2 Type II compliant and certified under the EU-U.S. Data Privacy Framework (DPF), UK Extension to the DPF, and Swiss-U.S. DPF, ensuring compliance with the highest standards of security and privacy.
Learn more about Gainsight’s AI Data Security and Privacy at https://www.gainsight.com/security/ai/.
Made for Executives
AI-driven customer intelligence should be effortless, integrated and trustworthy. It should also be consumable by everyone from your front line to your C-suite.
Staircase AI is built for executives who need instant, decision-ready insights, not just more data. It surfaces early churn risks, engagement trends, and revenue opportunities in a way that’s clear and ready to action. Get the blueprint for how Gainsight’s CEO uses Staircase AI to act on churn before it happens.
