The Alchemists

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the President of OneDoor Studios

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

We develop, produce, and set the global distribution for major motion pictures and series.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire The Alchemists to accomplish?

• Build a complex and beautiful website for our company.

SOLUTION

How did you find The Alchemists?

Webflow Professional Database

Why did you select The Alchemists over others?

• Pricing fit our budget
• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Company values aligned

How many teammates from The Alchemists were assigned to this project?

2-5 Employees

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

They built out the user interface for our website on the Webflow system, exceeding our expectations. They also worked with multiple third-party companies to integrate vital backend API integrations.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Our website is our primary form of business. We have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars as a result of the website.

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

The team is personable and responcible. Deliveries were on time, and if communication was ever unclear, they were gracious and quick to resolve the issue.

What was your primary form of communication with The Alchemists?

Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I would prefer to work with the people who run this shop over a larger company even if it was a better price. These guys are fun to work with, do excellent work (top notch...compatible to the best web development shops in the world) and they are super creative. Not only that, they are very well connected to other business leaders in marketing and the film industry.

Are there any areas for improvement or something The Alchemists could have done differently?

They have already been active in shoring up their weaknesses in the area of project management, so I would say no, not really.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the operations manager of Inverse Labs - a start up studio that engineers products and ideas for clients from design, to manufacturing and monetization.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire The Alchemists?

Our company hired The Alchemists to consult us on our tech stack.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We found The Alchemists through a mutual friend which recommended them to us. We felt very comfortable with them and that we could trust them. They're experience and portfolio showed us what we needed to see to make our decision to work with them.

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

They took time to understand our operation, identify pain points in our workflow, and research the most fitting products for our company. The project started with a discovery meeting, then they took time to research, then we would meet about once a week or every 2 weeks, while they simultaneously worked on the back end.

How many resources from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

A tech consultant, developer, IT specialist and account manager.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

We condensed our tech stack into a smaller, but more efficient bundle which completely optimized our entire working methodology. We can now move through our work flow with client's faster and turn over projects sooner leaving us the opportunity to take on more clients.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

It was great. We had meetings over zoom and stayed in touch through slack and emails as well. If there was a week we didn't meet, the account manager sent us a courtesy email letting us know everything was on track still.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Their knowledge of digital products and accessibility to tech software was impressive.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

Slightly more communication, but it also didn't bother us since we had updates every week.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the founder of First Team Lending Group, a mortgage brokerage in Troy, Michigan.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire The Alchemists?

Our website was having some bugs and issues when we hired The Alchemists to work on it and get the user experience running smoothly.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We were recommended by another local company that had worked with them before. They informed me that they worked quickly, were flexible and went out of their way to recommend solutions that were out of scope.

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

First, they did an audit of our site and identified the bugs. They presented them to me with solutions that they could offer at their price. They then spent a month and a half fixing the bugs and implementing extra features onto our site to enhance the user experience and design. They kept us up to date with phone calls and emails every week.

How many resources from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

An account executive who managed the account and kept us updated and a web developer on the back end.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

Our website is much easier to navigate through now and we are finding more client leads coming in through the site than before.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Everything was good. We were given a timeline at the beginning of the project and everything was finished on time. We stayed in touch mostly through email and over the phone. I didn't experience any issues with workflow or communication.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They were very knowledgeable about web developing, branding and took the time to understand our industry as well. Everything went smoothly for this reasonably quick project.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

None

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

ReturnBear is a reverse logistics company that provides an easy user friendly solution to handling retailers' returns. I am a senior product manager that helps facilitate product development for the company

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire The Alchemists, and what were your goals?

We hired The Alchemists to build our rebranded landing site with multiple complex animations in a very compressed timeline and somewhat in-motion designs.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We searched through multiple vendors for the right one to implement our website on Webflow and are so happy we chose The Alchemists for this task! They fit our requirements in terms of size, the scope of the project, technical ability to implement, and pricing. It was great to get a good idea of their portfolio of work and seeing many examples of live sites they have worked on in the past. They were also knowledgeable when it came down to breaking up our project in module form, and they were able to communicate well with our internal team members--our designers, PMs, and engineers to get the project off the ground.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and technologies used.

Our project was a five-page landing site with multiple customized animations. The five pages included our home page, our contact form, our blog landing page, our blog post page, and an about us page. They were able to translate our designs incredibly well to the web, taking our Figma file and working through the page development as well as the animations involved. The result was a high-fidelity version of our rebranded website with all the added extras of on-scroll transitions and on-hover animations. We loved that they went above and beyond to accommodate our shortened timeline with a "Rush" option, and they were able to roll with the punches in terms of design changes that came at the moment. The Alchemists really ensured a high-quality deliverable by including a QA round in their scope of work, and they were always fast with the deliverable turnaround. We opted for daily checkouts which helped us stay abreast of all their development work and progress each day. They were able to work with us to hit a very shortened timeline and ensured they were delivering great value each day they were working with us.

How many people from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

We communicated with a project manager and Daniel, the web flow developer the most.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

Our project was a five-page landing site with multiple customized animations. The five pages included our home page, our contact form, our blog landing page, our blog post page, and an about us page. They were able to translate our designs incredibly well to the web, taking our Figma file and working through the page development as well as the animations involved. The result was a high-fidelity version of our rebranded website with all the added extras of on-scroll transitions and on-hover animations. We loved that they went above and beyond to accommodate our shortened timeline with a "Rush" option, and they were able to roll with the punches in terms of design changes that came at the moment. The Alchemists really ensured a high-quality deliverable by including a QA round in their scope of work, and they were always fast with the deliverable turnaround. We opted for daily checkouts which helped us stay abreast of all their development work and progress each day. They were able to work with us to hit a very shortened timeline and ensured they were delivering great value each day they were working with us.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timeliness.

We used slack, email, zoom, Figma, and Webflow

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They were incredibly committed to ensuring a successful website launch for us. They put a lot of thought and attention to detail on the complex designs that we wanted and were able to implement them to a T. They were also very adaptable to a shortened timeline as well as changes that were made along the way--they had a kind of flexibility that was very easy and pleasant to work with.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

I think in a remote working model, over-communication can help. I found that once we figured out a communication cadence that worked for everyone, the rest ran very smoothly.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

In my role as VP of Marketing for Firefly Tutors, I was hired by the CEO to assess all marketing activities and define a marketing strategy and plan to support future growth.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire The Alchemists?

Our website was dated and our brand differentiation online was weak in a highly competitive marketplace. Given the growth objectives of the firm, both needed to be addressed. We hired The Alchemists to help us strengthen our brand expression and build a differentiated experience through a new website.

SOLUTION

How did you select The Alchemist and what were the deciding factors?

We considered 20 potential partners through an RFP process that included me, the CEO, and the sales team. We were looking for a partner with branding expertise and customer experience design expertise. Evidence of an ability to deliver a unique, creative web design was important in the selection process because creativity is an important part of our brand.

We selected The Alchemists because we felt they fully understood what our brand was about and could bring it to life online.

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

The Alchemists facilitated a series of brand discovery sessions and then presented us with four alternatives for brand identification and design. Once we landed on a brand direction, they then created a brand guideline booklet and provided several design options for our new website. Together we defined the site architecture and finalized the wireframes. Then, The Alchemists more fully developed the key sections of the website and we held review meetings weekly to provide input.

We first launched an MVP, a simpler website, to get us to market quickly. This was suggested by The Alchemists to help us drive growth as soon as possible. Our MVP was launched in February and our full site was launched in May. As part of the project, The Alchemists also worked with us on benchmarking web metrics and set up the site for ongoing tracking and analysis.

How many resources from The Alchemist team worked with you, and what were their positions?

In total, we worked with three people, two creative designers, and a project manager.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The new Firefly Tutors brand received outstanding feedback from our survey of parents. Our tutors are also very positive about the new brand direction. The website uses a whimsical design that include

s motion which is resonating with our target audience. Since we just launched the new site a few weeks ago, we do not have a depth of data yet but are already seeing a lift in activity online.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

We met weekly in the early stages of the project and continued to meet regularly as new work was ready for input. Our working meetings were both fun and focused. The Alchemists did a great job assuring our meetings stayed on task.

Updates were also provided via an online project management portal. The workflow worked well and we were always kept up to date.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

In addition to being talented designers, The Alchemists are great listeners and did an amazing job hearing our feedback and integrating our ideas while maintaining a beautiful and quality design. Their talent here is truly remarkable and something I've not seen in my 20 plus years in marketing.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

Our target date for launch of the full site slipped a bit due to our interest in building out multiple pieces of content that the Firefly Tutors team was creating internally before launch (learning tip videos, the blog, etc.). As a team, we could have done a better job managing these elements as part of the total project plan.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Founder and Owner of Charcutology - a food service company that caters charcuterie boards and grazing tables for events.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire The Alchemists?

Social Media Marketing and content creation

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

A good friend of mine works in the family of companies and recommended the service to me. I compared their work to the work of a couple other agencies that I looked into and The Alchemists were significantly better in terms of content quality, speed and results they displayed from past clients.

Describe the project in detail and walk through the stages of the project.

After I was onboarded with The Alchemists, we did a brand discovery where they walked me through a series of questions and exercises that revealed my brand's purpose, values, aesthetics, tone, etc. They then took time to brainstorm and send me over moodboards and copy examples. We worked together to perfect the identity, aesthetic and tone. When I was happy with it, they made a content calendar for a month out. I approved it and a couple weeks later after this process was finalized they began posting and we continued this cycle and still are.

How many resources from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

An account executive, copywriter, graphic designer, and social media manager.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

My followers on Instagram increased 44% since I started working with them. My lead generation doubled. The overall aesthetic of my online brand presence is much more professional. I feel my ROI came back fairly quickly.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

It was good, we met every other week after the initial discovery phase was over and we were on a consistent schedule.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

I'm impressed with the quality of their work and how well they understand my brand.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

No