Ideally scales culture and customer obsession with agile Airwallex tools

Ideally is an NZ-born, AI-powered consumer intelligence and testing platform that helps brands bring real customer voices into creative, product, and marketing decisions. Built initially as an overnight concept-testing tool, it rapidly evolved into an "opportunity engine" which has been embraced by enterprise-grade and challenger brands around the world. 

“We founded Ideally because traditional research was slow, expensive and often inaccessible,” says Josh Nuu-Steele, Co-Founder and CRO. “With AI, we can get real consumer feedback in hours instead of weeks, and bring customers into the creative and innovation journey rather than testing once at the end.”

In just 2.5 years, Ideally already had people on the ground in Auckland, Sydney and New York, and customers across multiple regions. But that pace of expansion also supercharged operational complexities.

Transaction limits, slow transfers, and new market mishaps

Before Airwallex, Josh and Chief Operations Officer Cassie McAdams were using traditional banking, and encountering several friction points. 

Cassie McAdams

Chief Operations Officer, Ideally

It’s absolutely bonkers how the banking system just doesn’t align with modern ways of working.

When Ideally started winning customers in the United States, those clients wanted to pay into a local US bank account. But traditional banking requirements made setting one up tricky.

US institutions required someone to visit a branch in person, and provide a social security number and local business address. While they were stuck navigating that process, revenue opportunities were slipping away.

Paying global teams was also a headache. Slow international transfers could take 2-5 days to arrive, during which time their funds were effectively frozen, while high FX and transaction fees were adding to payroll costs. 

At first, Ideally moved their global payroll to another digital provider, but quickly ran into low monthly transaction limits. As headcount and salaries grew, they were constantly bumping up against that cap.

At the end of every month, Cassie found herself putting the brakes on basic spending.

Cassie McAdams

Chief Operations Officer, Ideally

In the early days, I had to tell the team, ‘Don’t buy laptops and software until next month, we’re up against our account limits.’ It meant delaying things we genuinely needed to grow.

A global, flexible, and speedy solution

Everything immediately changed when Ideally started with Airwallex Global Accounts. 

Airwallex provides Ideally a single, global financial platform they can roll out market-by-market, instead of starting from scratch with a different bank and toolset in each country.

Cassie was able to quickly set up local currency accounts in NZD, AUD, and USD, to receive and hold funds exactly where they were needed. Now Cassie can follow customer demand, entering a market as soon as the commercial opportunity appears, instead of waiting on bank paperwork.

With Airwallex’s built-in FX tools and flexible caps, she can now convert funds that land whenever it suits the business, not the bank. Customers can also pay into familiar, local accounts while Ideally manages all transactions from a streamlined platform.

As for payroll, instead of sweating over limits and cut-off times, it “just runs in the background” while the team focuses on revenue and customers.

Rethinking reimbursements

Ideally is obsessive about culture. They bring new global hires to New Zealand for onboarding, run annual “ThinkFest” sessions, and deliberately export their values into every new office.

“The thing I’m proudest of is our people," says Josh. "We’ve been very intentional about building a team that’s smart, kind and low-ego, and then giving them the tools and support to do their best work."

Financial infrastructure is part of that culture story. The existing setup, built for a smaller team in a single market, was starting to show its age. Finance wanted a model that put company funds directly in employees' hands and gave the business a real-time view of spend.

"Airwallex has enabled us to move off a reimbursement process which wasn't the right fit for our culture," reflects Cassie.

An elevated way to expense

With Airwallex Corporate Cards and Expense Management, Ideally flipped the model. 

Now around 80% of the team have an Airwallex Card, with new joiners getting issued digital cards within minutes. Everyone is also equipped with the Airwallex mobile app, so that team members simply pay for what they need and upload the receipt on the spot.

Cassie McAdams

Chief Operations Officer, Ideally

Our team loves using Airwallex for their expenses. It’s so intuitive we’ve had basically zero questions – people just get their card and run it from their phone.

On the back end, Cassie and her team have total transparency on spending by person and by market. They can freeze cards, set limits, or cancel cards in seconds. For large expenses, she can temporarily increase a team member’s card cap, then dial it back down once the purchase is made. 

With this easy-to-follow data trail, end of month reconciliation is a breeze. Reimbursement spreadsheets and awkward expense chasing are gone for good.

A partnership that’s ideal in every way

Looking back, Cassie is glad Ideally moved to Airwallex early. 

Cassie McAdams

Chief Operations Officer, Ideally

We have one traditional bank here in New Zealand, and pretty quickly adopted Airwallex after that. I can’t even imagine unwinding multiple banks and payments later.

For a company rewriting how brands use customer insight, and scaling as one of New Zealand’s fastest-growing tech platforms, Airwallex provides the global infrastructure that lets them focus on pushing creativity and product innovation, not fighting financial friction.

Disclaimer: The information contained herein is factual information only and is not intended to imply any recommendation or opinion about a financial product.