The 3D Cloud Method: Building a 110% Net Retention Engine in an Emerging Category

In a new category, customer retention isn’t just a metric – it’s a survival strategy. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Beck Besecker revealed how 3D Cloud built a sustainable retention engine in the emerging 3D commerce space.

Retention as the North Star

“The most important metric I care about is retention,” Beck emphasizes. “And the worst thing you can do is take a client where the value proposition isn’t very strong and you’re constantly trying to fill the holes. Right. To keep it’s energy sapping.”

This focus shapes everything from customer selection to implementation strategy. Rather than chasing rapid growth, 3D Cloud prioritizes finding the right fit from the start.

The Integration Moat

What makes 3D Cloud’s offering particularly sticky is the depth of integration required. As Beck explains, “Imagine I onboarded your entire kitchen catalog. Like, all the business rules and integrations. It’s kind of a hybrid between an enterprise software and a SaaS. It’s like the first four months are integrations and content.”

This comprehensive onboarding creates natural stickiness: “We break even in the first four months, but then it’s highly profitable and high retention after.”

Strategic Customer Selection

The path to high retention begins before the sale. Beck describes their approach: “We spend a lot of time up front with our customer success team, with our delivery team, with our head of strategy, making sure it’s a good value proposition. They have the ability to pay. They’re at a scale that’s going to work for them, and of course, that drives retention.”

Building for Complex Use Cases

3D Cloud’s solution addresses fundamental challenges in high-consideration purchases. As Beck explains, “If you’re going to buy a high consideration product like in the home category… they’re expensive, they have a lot of configurable parts that have to be put together in a shared scene, it’s a complex data model.”

This complexity creates an opportunity for deep value creation. Their platform transforms a traditionally painful process: “Historically, if you were going to build one of these projects, you would go find a professional. You’d sit in a store, they’d have like an old off white beige desktop monitor, and they’d be flipping through a catalog and ticking away, and you’d be sitting there for 2 hours sort of just wanting to pull your hair out.”

The Results

Their focus on retention has paid off. “Our net retention is 110 or something like that. We’ve got really good retention,” Beck shares. This success has enabled steady, sustainable growth: “Historical growth rate 25% for the last five, six years. That was just about the right pace. We’re not a hockey stick business.”

Building Long-term Value

Rather than optimizing for rapid scaling, 3D Cloud focuses on creating lasting value. Their solution fundamentally changes how their customers operate: “What we do as a company, we are a 3D content management system for the home category… We’re in kitchen, bath, decking, furniture, office, and storage. And they all have the same thing in common, which is you got to take a bunch of individual skus, get them into a shared scene, make it an inspiring experience that people want to buy and help them check out.”

For founders building in new categories, 3D Cloud’s approach offers valuable lessons. High retention doesn’t come from growth hacks or quick fixes – it comes from careful customer selection, deep integration, and a focus on solving fundamental business problems. Sometimes, the path to sustainable growth means taking four months to properly onboard a customer rather than rushing to close the next deal.

In an emerging category where the rules are still being written, 3D Cloud’s method suggests that patient, strategic customer development might be the surest path to long-term success.