Brackwell Freight Ltd / BB-Demo – Qbr
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Brackwell Freight Ltd: documents · 2026-01-02 13:00
On the 2 Jan 2026 QBR, Liam Doherty said he must justify the Growth spend to his board. Active users average under six a day, down nearly a third on the quarter. Data is fresh, so the issue is adoption.
What was said
What this says
Current to 10 Oct 26On the 2 Jan 2026 QBR, Liam Doherty said he must justify the Growth spend to his board. Active users average under six a day, down nearly a third on the quarter. Data is fresh, so the issue is adoption.
What happened: Marcus Bell took Liam and Aisha Rahman through usage. Active users average under six a day, down nearly a third, and Aisha is the main user and bottleneck for the depot managers.
Customer view: Liam has a board conversation coming about tool spend and needs to say what the brain is worth. His best proof is a November retail exception caught before the customer rang.
Commercial: Marcus confirmed the order form and invoices match and nothing is overdue. The contract runs to the end of November, and Tom, the account owner, was named for the commercial side.
Watch: Adoption sits with one person, which is a key-person risk. No tickets were raised, and Aisha mentioned possible morning slowness without evidence.
Themes
Current to 9 Oct 26Theme
Adoption and value case
Importance
renewal
Sentiment
mixed
Voice
champion
Who was there
BB-Demo
CRMmade from
Them
CRMmade from
Follow-up
Next steps
Current to 9 Oct 26- Marcus Bell to send times for a working session before the end of January to build the exceptions dashboard.
- Liam Doherty to write up the November retail case, with Aisha Rahman supplying notes and screenshots.
- Marcus Bell to email the usage report so Liam has it for the board conversation.
Risks
Current to 9 Oct 26- Low active use against forty licensed seats leaves the Growth fee hard to defend at the board's tool-spend review.
- Most questions come through Aisha Rahman, a key-person risk if she is away or leaves.
- The renewal at the end of November lands while usage is still low.
Opportunities
Current to 9 Oct 26- An overnight exceptions dashboard on the Growth dashboards builder could bring the depot managers in.
- The on-site training day add-on was raised, to be handed to Tom if wanted.
Transcript
Marcus Bell NoneHello, afternoon both. Can you hear me alright?
Liam Doherty NoneLoud and clear. Happy new year, Marcus. Did you get a proper break?- Marcus Bell NoneA few days, yeah. Mostly sofa and leftovers. You?
- Liam Doherty NoneSame. The office is a ghost town, only the depots are really running. Aisha's in the room with me, she's on her own laptop so you might get a bit of echo.
Aisha Rahman NoneHi Marcus. Sorry, just flagging, I'll mute when I'm not talking. Is that better?- Marcus Bell NoneMuch better, thanks Aisha. Right, I'm going to share my screen and say what I want to cover. It's the quarterly review, so I've pulled the numbers for usage, I want to go through who's actually using the brain, and then I'd like to hear what's working and what isn't. Happy to go wherever you want after that.
- Liam Doherty NoneLove that. Go on.
- Marcus Bell NoneSo, the headline. You're on Growth, forty licensed users, forty-four thousand a year on the order form, and the invoices match that, nothing overdue on your side, so that's all tidy. The thing I wanted to put in front of you is the active users. Across the last month it's averaging under six people a day. And that's down by nearly a third on the quarter before.
- Liam Doherty NoneMm. Right. Yeah, I thought it might be.
- Marcus Bell NoneI don't want to read too much into one month, because December is always odd. But it's a drop on the quarter as a whole, not just the last few weeks, so I wanted us to look at it together rather than me just emailing you a chart.
- Liam Doherty NoneNo, fair. Honestly, part of it is peak. The retail contracts are flat out from November, the depot account managers are on the phones all day, they're not going to open a new tool. That's the bit that worries me, if I'm honest. One view, that's the point, and they just haven't got into the habit.
- Marcus Bell NoneYeah. And that matches what I can see. When I split it by person, it's a small group. There's you, there's Aisha, and a few people from the ops side. The depot account managers are barely in there.
- Aisha Rahman NoneThat's me, mostly. I use it for the Tuesday review. I pull the delivery exceptions and the account notes together before the meeting, and then I'm in and out. I've tried to show a couple of the depot managers but, um, I've not really had the time to sit with them.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat's useful, Aisha, thank you. And do they ask you things instead? Like, do they message you rather than ask the brain themselves?
- Aisha Rahman NoneSometimes, yes. Someone will ping me, can you check what's happened with this customer, and I'll look it up and send it back. Which I suppose defeats the purpose a bit.
- Liam Doherty NoneIt does defeat the purpose. Right, that's the thing, isn't it. Aisha's the bottleneck and she's lovely about it.
- Aisha Rahman NoneI don't mind. I just don't want it all to sit with me.
- Marcus Bell NoneNo, and that's a fair thing to say out loud. For what it's worth, it's a pattern I see on other accounts. A couple of people end up asking most of the questions, and it's fine until one of them is off or moves on. Then it goes quiet very quickly. I'm not saying that's where you are, I'm just saying it's worth getting a few more people asking.
- Liam Doherty NoneYeah. No, I hear that. Can I ask something else though? The numbers. There's no tickets, is there? Nothing from us.
- Marcus Bell NoneNothing in the last month, no. Not one. And that could be good news, it could be that everything's working, the connectors are loading, the records are coming in. I've checked that and the refresh looks healthy. But I'd rather you told me if there's something you've worked around and not bothered raising.
- Aisha Rahman NoneThere's nothing broken. Is it me or is it a bit slower in the mornings? That's all I'd say. But I don't think it's a real problem, I've not got a screenshot or anything.
- Marcus Bell NoneOkay. If it happens again, grab a screenshot and the time, and raise it. Even a small one. I'd rather have a ticket that turns out to be nothing.
- Aisha Rahman NoneOkay. I will. Thanks.
- Liam Doherty NoneLook, can I be straight with you, Marcus? I've got a conversation coming with the board about what we spend on tools. Everyone's looking at lines. And forty seats, forty-four thousand, with six people in it on a good day. I've got to be able to say what it's worth.
- Marcus Bell NoneYeah. Understood. And I'm not going to argue the commercial side, that sits with Tom, he's your account owner, and he'd want to be part of that conversation. What I can do is help you make the case with usage. What did the brain actually do for you this quarter? That's what I'd like to get to.
- Liam Doherty NoneOkay. Well. The one I'd point to, there was a retail account in November where the delivery exceptions were piling up and the calls were getting sharper. We saw it in the brain before the customer rang. That was the whole reason we bought it. Aisha flagged it, I took it to the depot manager, and we sorted it out before it turned into a formal complaint.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat's exactly the case. Can you write that down, even just a few lines? Who spotted it, what you saw, what you did. I'll put it next to the usage report, because a number on its own doesn't say much and that story does.
- Liam Doherty NoneYeah, I can do that. Aisha, can you help me with the dates?
- Aisha Rahman NoneYes, I've got the notes from the Tuesday review. I can send you the screenshots.
- Marcus Bell NoneBrilliant. Now, the other half. The depot account managers. What would make them open it? Because I can run a training session, I can sit with them, but I'd rather it was built around something they already do.
- Liam Doherty NoneTheir morning. They start with a list of the accounts that had exceptions overnight. If the brain gave them that list, in the format they already use, they'd use it. They don't want to go and ask it things, they want it to hand them the list.
- Marcus Bell NoneRight, that's a dashboard, essentially. You've got the dashboards builder on Growth. Has anyone built one yet?
- Liam Doherty NoneI built one early on and, um, it's out of date, to be honest. I've not touched it.
- Aisha Rahman NoneI've not built any. I wasn't sure if I was allowed. I'm the admin but I didn't want to change something of Liam's.
- Liam Doherty NoneOh, you're absolutely allowed. Please. Do it.
- Marcus Bell NoneHonestly, Aisha, you can't break anything, it's built on the data, nothing gets overwritten. What I'd suggest is we do a working session, the three of us, an hour or so, and build that overnight exceptions list together. Then you take it to the depot managers as a thing rather than as a login.
- Aisha Rahman NoneI'd like that. I'd be less nervous if you were there.
- Marcus Bell NoneOf course. Shall we book that for the next couple of weeks? I know things are a bit mad.
- Liam Doherty NoneYeah. Let's do it before the end of January, I'd say. Before they all get properly busy again with the new contracts.
- Marcus Bell NoneOkay, I'll send some times this afternoon. One more thing on the numbers, and then I'll stop sharing. The connectors. You've got the CRM, the helpdesk, the call recorder, and Microsoft 365 going in. They're all loading, records are still going up, so the data's fresh. Nothing stale. So it's an adoption question, not a data question. I wanted that to be clear.
- Liam Doherty NoneThat's reassuring, actually. I was half expecting you to say something was broken.
- Marcus Bell NoneNo. It's all running. It just needs more people in it.
- Liam Doherty NoneRight. Can we get the depots on it. That's the actual question. Is there anything else you do, like a session for each depot, or does it all land on us?
- Marcus Bell NoneI can do short sessions, remote, maybe one per depot, or two depots at a time, whatever suits. There's also an on-site training day as an add-on, and I'd have to hand that to Tom to talk through if you wanted it. But I'd start remote and see who turns up.
- Liam Doherty NoneRemote is fine. Honestly, if they see Aisha's list first, they'll want it.
- Aisha Rahman NoneI can walk the depot managers through it after the Tuesday review. They're all on the call anyway.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat's a good idea, a few minutes at the end of a meeting they're already in. Okay. So, to pull it together. Aisha, you'll send Liam the notes and screenshots from the November account. Liam, you'll write up the case, a few lines. I'll send times for the working session and I'll put the usage report in an email so you've got it for the board conversation.
- Liam Doherty NoneAnd we think about which depot managers go first.
- Marcus Bell NoneYes, good, two or three who are keen. Not all of them, just the ones who'll make a noise about it afterwards.
- Liam Doherty NoneThat'd be the Trafford Park lot. They're the loudest.
- Marcus Bell NonePerfect. One last thing, and I'm not trying to hurry anyone. The contract runs to the end of November and renews in December. Tom will be in touch about that nearer the time, and I'll be doing the renewal notice conversation with you well before. I'm mentioning it so it's not a surprise, that's all.
- Liam Doherty NoneNo, understood. Better to know. Let's get the usage up and then we've got something to say.
- Marcus Bell NoneThat's exactly how I'd put it. Anything else from you two?
- Aisha Rahman NoneNo, I think that's everything. Thanks Marcus.
- Liam Doherty NoneNothing from me. Cheers, Marcus. Speak soon.
- Marcus Bell NoneThanks both. Speak soon, bye.
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