Incubated from the minds of the team members and one of the original co-founders of nCino, Wilmington-based Raleon provides an AI-powered optimization platform to help retail e-commerce brands grow their customer lifetime value (LTV).
From his days in the sunny hills of Silicon Valley to his move to the (arguably) even sunnier dunes of Wilmington, Raleon Co-Founder Nathan Snell has always loved working with startups. Upon his departure from nCino in January 2022, he sought to channel that passion into ways to work even closer with entrepreneurs while still utilizing his product and automation background.
That’s when he decided to venture into the retail e-commerce space, where he found that a common challenge among brands is driving repeat purchases from their customers.
“Brands, in a lot of cases, have all this amazing technology and marketing around acquiring their first customers,” Snell said. “You do the sophisticated realm of testing everything, you’ve got all these different attribution methods at first, but after you actually win the customer, there isn’t any tech there at all to drive customer lifetime value.”
And according to Snell, with the increasing costs of acquiring first customers, the need for retaining a stable customer LTV has never been higher. Depending on the industry, some studies indicate that acquiring a new customer can cost five to seven times more than retaining one.
With its AI-powered solution, Raleon automates predictive segments that learn a brand and its customers to generate unique insights and signals. In other words, the platform’s AI can track and understand the likelihood of a returning customer based on that brand’s LTV goals.
Raleon also manages the segments on its end, so that brands don’t have to spend time and resources conducting their own customer research. These AI-generated segments can be created in under 10 seconds and can then sync with popular email software like Klaviyo.
As an example, a brand that has a consumable product (such as shampoo) can use Raleon’s AI segments to communicate with their customers when those customers are most likely to need to replenish their product. From there, the brand can further segment its email communication to customers by, say, offering discounts to those who will be more likely to return after receiving one. This allows the brand to drive increases in revenue and margin.
According to Snell, Raleon has helped brands that have run specialized promotions to drive a two to five percent increase in their conversion rates.
“One of the things that comes up is a brand often treats a new customer the same way as they would treat a customer who has purchased from them eight times,” Snell explained. “The reality is that those two customers should be treated differently because what they care about and what’s meaningful to them are different.”
Raleon’s AI segmentation, along with its customized loyalty programs and “gift with purchase” campaigns, can help stores and brands understand their customers in a better and more sustainable way. Snell said that he understands that businesses, especially those that are small to medium sized, have limited resources to connect with their customers.
Within this all-in-one platform, brands are now able to serve their customers better and hone their focus into applying the best practices for their customers’ LTV.
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Startup: Raleon
Co-Founders: Nathan Snell (CEO), Adam Larson (CTO)
Founded: 2024
Team size: 5
Location: Wilmington, NC
Website: https://raleon.io/
Funding: Closed a $3.8M funding round, looking to raise in 2025
“I’ve been in the enterprise space for my entire career, but I think this [brand/e-commerce] space is really fascinating, especially on the tech side,” Snell said. “It’s really appealing being able to carve out a new category [for brands] and really innovate on the lifetime value optimization side, while seeing new opportunities with AI create good results we’re starting to see with current customers.”
Since its official release in the beginning of 2024, Raleon has curated over 200 customers. According to the startup’s website, more than 500,000 shoppers have used the loyalty program, and brands using Raleon have enjoyed a 300% ROI.
Snell relays that brands (or agencies that work with brands who are looking to grow their revenue and customer LTV) should reach out and chat with the Raleon team.
He also emphasizes that having witnessed the exciting growth in the Wilmington and Triangle startup ecosystems, he welcomes any founders in the area to connect with him.
