Ambaum

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Lead Creative at a cycling technology startup.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

Have built and managed our DTC shopify website ourselves, we started to run into many backend and frontend issues and trouble scaling the site as we started to quickly grow and have need for a more complex site.

SOLUTION

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

Ambaum came recommended by another organization we work with.

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

Since Ambaum has joined, we have relied immensely on them to solve all of our shopify issues and requests. We regularly add new pages to the site, which they often build for us from scratch, and request custom functionality, which they are always able to accommodate.

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

A project manager has been our main point of contact throughout the retainer. A team of a few developers support the workflow, depending on availability. Sometimes I communicate directly with the developers which can be very helpful.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Since bringing on Ambaum, our staff has been able to save countless hours on a weekly basis not digging through shopify menus and code to make changes and updates. We can now focus on our roles and rely on Ambaum to implement all of the site changes.

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

Amabum's project manager is attentive, proactive, and professional. We regularly communicate about needs in a dedicated channel in our company's own slack and Ambaum is always accommodating of strange hours and difficult requests.

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

I am always very pleased and impressed whenever Ambaum takes initiative and proactively anticipates our needs. Our team all wears many hats and to have the web dev hat taken care of is a huge help.

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

The one area I would Ambuam could improve is double-checking work before sending it over for review. Sometimes the dev build doesn't match the creative specs but their team is always quick to fix things when I point them out.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Biotics Research provides dietary supplements via B2B and B2C channels. I was the Sr Manager of Digital Marketing for this project.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

To develop a Shopify Plus store with content for multiple customer groups with advanced scripting and advanced business requirements. Also to develop an API connector to the ERP.

SOLUTION

How did you select Ambaum and what were the deciding factors?

Received a recommendation from Shopify and vetted the agency with multiple calls for references to prior and current clients. Willingness to work with our budget.

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

Ambaum's team worked with us to scope the requirements, design the UX blueprint, translated our designs to customize a theme, customized content pages, developed complex scripting for multiple customer groups and business requirements using tags, defined the app stack for our needs and helped customize and implement these, user training for our customer service team, ongoing troubleshooting and customization to continue optimization of the site based on customer feedback, Developing an API connector to our ERP.

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

Multiple resources- our project manager (Andrew is fantastic!), a designer, and multiple developers for various parts of the project.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Extremely high-quality talent 

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

They have been very responsive and attentive.- excellent communication.

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

Very professional yet personable.

Are there any areas for improvement?

No

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Glowforge makes a 3D laser printer. I'm the VP of Software Engineering.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire BTown Web?

We hired BTownWeb to migrate our ecommerce from our highly customized Solidus solution to Shopify.

What were your goals for this project?

We had customized Solidus for a customer referral system, SKU-specific credits, post-crowdfunding shipping acceptance flows and many other features. Our internal teams were making do with terrible integration and reporting. We wanted to move to Shopify while retaining the essential customizations we'd made in Solidus.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We reached out to Shopify for referrals as well as working my own network. We interviewed multiple options and BTownWeb was by far the most impressive.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

BTown built custom Shopify Scripts, services, integrations, and dashboards as well as customizing our theme to meet our requirements.

What was the team composition?

Almost all of the work was done by a single engineer, who worked very closely with my team on a daily basis, although he was remote.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Moving off of Solidus is having a massive impact throughout our business. We are reclaiming time that was wasted on manual processes throughout the company.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Simple coordination between our engineering manager and the BTown Web engineer.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The thing that made BTown a great partner is that we were able to give them a really solid spec and then they just executed on it beautifully, while remaining in close contact so that we could adapt to all of the little surprises that show up on every project. They delivered on-time, on-budget, and at very high quality.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Nope, this went great.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there. 

I’m the communications director at a nonprofit research and policy organization. We look at how to advance policies that ensure everybody in Washington State has the chance to thrive economically.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with BTown Web?

We had a terribly outdated website and content management system. We needed a new website that was completely overhauled in terms of information architecture, functionality, accessibility, and audience engagement.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement? 

BTown Web was partnering with another firm called Flying Crow Creative. We hired Flying Crow Creative to work with us to determine our audience needs and the general visual design. They provided mockups and diagrams to BTown Web, who did all of the actual development. It was a huge undertaking because they had to migrate everything from Plone CMS into WordPress. They made sure everything came over correctly so we didn’t lose any data or links. 

I was able to work closely with their team throughout development and testing. Post-launch, we decided to use them for hosting the site. They're also doing regular security updates and maintenance, as well as tweaks and edits as needed.

What is the team composition? 

My main contact is Matt (programmer, BTown Web). I also am in regular communication with Liz (web developer, BTown Web) and Chad (founder, BTown Web). There might have been other team members working behind the scenes. 

How did you come to work with BTown Web? 

Flying Crow Creative was one of the final candidates during the bid process. I wanted to know more about their developers. Before we hired them, I got on the phone with Chad to ask technical questions about how they would develop the project. I was very impressed with Chad and with BTown Web. I appreciated that they’re a local firm based out of Seattle that cares about investing in the community. I liked their approach so we hired Flying Crow Creative in part because of their relationship with BTown Web. 

What is the status of this engagement? 

Work started in February 2018, and the official launch was in December 2018. They continue to provide hosting and maintenance services.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

BTown Web helped us create several new sections of our website to make it easier for users to find our materials. They created a new resources and tools section where users can find PDFs and videos. That page is now in the top 10 of most viewed pages on our website. More of our current content is showing up in our top 40 most viewed pages whereas before it was older content.

We didn't anticipate a huge influx of new users, but we're seeing more meaningful website engagement. We’ve seen a huge increase in the number of people subscribing to our e-communications and clicking on our donate page. We're very pleased that the bounce rate has gone down by 13% and the percentage of return visitors has increased. 

How did BTown Web perform from a project management standpoint? 

BTown Web is exceptional. Matt is incredibly responsive. We had a great working relationship. He helped me understand if things wouldn't work the way that I requested. We did regular check-ins using email, phone, and Zoom calls. The whole team has been super responsive from start to finish, even doing quality control after launch. They provided trainings for our staff and put together a training manual. Liz was doing a lot of phenomenal work behind the scenes as well.

In terms of timing, the reason development took so long is because of all of the work that our organization had to do. As a think tank, our website is an information repository. It took a long time to go through 6,000 pages and decide what to keep or not to keep. It did take BTown Web longer than anticipated to migrate everything from Plone CMS to WordPress. My hope had always been that the site would launch by the end of 2018, and they hit that target.

What did you find most impressive about them? 

The other firm that we considered hiring wanted to shield their developers from interfacing with us. While I understand the need to keep high-maintenance clients from constantly contacting a developer, I had an agreement with Flying Crow Creative to work closely with whoever built our site. As the client, it was really helpful having access to Matt.

This kind of project can be quite stressful. It's a lot of pressure when you're the one to make the final call on who to hire. There's always that risk of having things go wrong. I absolutely made the right call that BTown Web is the right partner for our organization and our needs. 

Are there any areas they could improve? 

Perhaps there were minor things I'd recommend improving on, but I can't think of any right now.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the head of marketing at Crowd Cow.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with BTown Web?

We were looking for a vendor to help us develop a new e-commerce website.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We're an e-commerce company that sells steak directly from the farm. We wanted to have a website that would help us connect consumers with local ranchers so that ranchers can deliver the product directly to the customer. BTown Web built an MVP that is totally separate from our existing product. We gave them our requirements, and they built a rough wireframe. After that, we began prototyping. They helped us launch and customize a Shopify website so that it has the same look and feel of our main website.

What is the team composition?

We mostly worked with Chad (Founder and CEO, BTown Web) and Matt (Director of Product, BTown Web).

How did you come to work with BTown Web?

One of our engineers had worked with them previously and recommended them.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent between $5,000–$10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with them from October–December 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

We had a tight timeline and BTown Web delivered a high-quality product very quickly. The new website looks and operates similarly to our main site. Our revenue is two or three times higher than we had expected, so we’re very happy with the results.

How did BTown Web perform from a project management standpoint?

We mostly used email to stay in touch with Matt. They were very flexible, so we didn't have any issues. Also, the total cost was lower than we had expected.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They took on a project and turned it around very quickly for a lower price. I don’t think anyone could have done that better.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can't think of anything.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I definitely recommend them. They're a great team.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the CEO and co-founder of GraphicSchedule.com, a software startup that provides project management tools for construction teams. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with BTown Web?

We were looking for a local company to develop a WordPress site for us and add E-commerce features. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our old one-page website was very simple. BTown built a multipage Wordpress site for us. I did all the design in PowerPoint and sent it over to them, and they made it work.

What is the team composition? 

We mostly worked with Andrew Crawley [Web Developer, BTown Web], who did all the development work, and Chad Fisher [Fouder, BTown Web], who was our main point of contact for project management and billing.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent at least $8,000.

What is the status of this engagement? 

The largest part of the project was completed between December 2016–February 2017. We still use them as our on-call support team.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement? 

Their work is very high quality, and there have been no issues with the site. We have the origin story on the website featuring a timeline, a lot of pictures, and compelling content, and our customers find that page highly engaging. 

How did they perform from a project management standpoint? 

We use Trello internally to manage all of our development tasks, and they've been happy to work with our process. We also used email to discuss the terms of agreement.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're immediately accessible and delivered a great quality product. They're a trusted partner for me, available to work on a short notice. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We still send them a check, but it's possible that they take electronic payment now - we just haven't pushed that. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m Director of Marketing at Canopy Tours Northwest. We offer zip line tours on a historic farm.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenges were you trying to address with BTown Web?

We wanted to redesign our website to make it easier to use and to update it to current design trends.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

BTown did all the work to design our WordPress site. A few years ago, they assisted us with SEO work. This most recent project was just focused on the website. They designed it from what we described as our priorities and using some of what we already had.

We had some ideas for our lay out that they integrated. We wanted a photo-centric website because that's what sells our business very well. We have a compelling activity that lends itself to video and photos. They worked with us to make sure that that was reflected in the site’s design. We also have a reservation system that needed integration with “Book Now” buttons.

How did you come to work with BTown Web?

I was referred to them by my daughter who is a personal friend of one of the staff. For this most recent project we had two other companies we were considering. We knew that BTown had the capability to do the work. We had great experiences with them and we knew that they could do a good job. Their pricing was competitive as well.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent about $15,000 with them over the years.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in 2012 and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

The SEO work that we had them do originally really helped put us on the map. They helped us with keywords that make us rise to the top of searches. We’ve now had an increase in sales from the new website.

How did BTown Web perform from a project management standpoint?

They're very responsive and they have multiple people that assist with the project. Chad [Chad Fisher, Founder, BTown Web] is great at making sure everything is going according to plan. Everything has been on time and within budget.

They're good at staying on top of communication. We primarily use email but also have periodic conference calls to go through progress and discuss the design status.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I think they're really attentive to what the customer is looking for. That can be rare, especially in designing a website. It's easy to have your own idea of what it should be. They wanted to make sure that what they were producing works well for us. That’s ideal for us.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

You need to have a clear idea of what your goals are and what you really want to get out of the end product.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

My company is called C+C. and we are a Seattle based PR and social marketing company. I'm a group account director, which means I oversee some of our energy efficiency marketing business.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with BTown Web?

BTown has done a few things for us. The most recent project they worked on was to develop a consumer-facing website because we don't have internal web development capabilities.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We were working on a commercial energy efficiency project to bring together the city of Bellevue, Washington to participate in the building energy efficiency program. We're trying to get occupants involved in energy efficiency, called Urban Smart. This is a multi-audience, consumer targeted website. The audiences include commercial real estate, building ownership, and building engineers. There were a lot of different pieces involved in developing the website.

B-town was responsible for the development, while we had designed this site and were in charge of the marketing pieces. BTown Web put it all together to make sure it looked great, worked on all kinds of different platforms and that everything was working smooth and fast. They consulted with us on the best way to configure the website, it was built on WordPress. We provided them with all the design, content and copy, and they helped us to decide what fit on each page in the most efficient way possible so that it was accessible to our audiences.

How did you come to work with BTown Web

We've done work on several past projects with Chad [Founder, BTown Web] and his team. I've also known Chad for a long time, he is very trustworthy, responsible and responsive. BTown Web is my team’s go to on the development side because they're so easy to work with.

How much have you invested with them?

At the end of the day, we were up somewhere around $20,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started in September 2015 and it’s ongoing. However, the bulk of it ended the middle of 2016, now they have been doing upkeep and helping us add and subtract things.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

Most of my feedback is anecdotal and we've had great interactions with the site. Everybody seems to really like the way that it functions, which is kudos to them for sure. We never had any problems with any platform or browser, it's been pretty flawless on that side. Our audience is pretty small, we don't have huge site traffic, but it's functioned really well from the get go.

How did BTown Web perform from a project management standpoint?

Chad and his team are super responsive and smart. Specifically, Chad and Andrew [Web Developer, BTown Web] consult well, as they give us the most cost efficient options. They are easy to work with and very flexible at working within our budget and time constraints. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I would reiterate that these guys are smart, fast, listen really well, complete the work in a timely manner and on budget. They always communicate if it's going to cost more before they do anything. There have never been any hiccups in communication for us, and that is a super important piece of being a great partner.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, in fact, they made our project better by just being on the team. They really were a shining star on this project.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work at the Des Moines Pool Metropolitan Park District, and I am the district general manager. We’re a parks and recreation district.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with BTown Web?

We’re working with BTown Web to combine our pool which we manage, which is the Mount Rainier Pool’s website, and our district website, which has all our governance information on the district.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They were responsible for building a new WordPress website that incorporated both the information from the pool and also from the district. They also focused on making it user-friendly and mobile-friendly.

We had ideas of what we wanted the site to look like, but they were fully responsible for the look of it. So we took some templates that they provided and incorporated our ideas into those templates. We looked at other websites and got some input from our pool operators and looked at what people looked at primarily. But one of the ideas that we had was an interactive calendar. For example, if somebody was going to go to the pool, that they knew that day if there was any type of conflicts or anything to save them a trip, especially those people with little children.

They created a news blog that helps us communicate with our community. They also incorporated a call to action with all of our contact information and, so people could easily call, email or text us, and an interactive map people can use if they’re lost.

BTown Web also did a great job integrating our social media to our site. They helped us get integrated with Google Analytics and then made some recommendations on how we list stuff and kind of walked us through SEO best practices. We added a jobs page, and they’ve been really good at helping us better format the information.

How did you come to work with BTown Web?

We’re a government agency, and we put out a bidding process just to make sure that we didn’t have any type of favoritism choosing an agency. We made sure that it went out to everybody in the area because we want to make sure that we give our local companies a chance to compete with different organizations. It was really nice because BTown’s pretty close to us. They’re local and were a good fit, so we chose them.

How much have you invested with them?

I think it cost about 8,000 total.

What is the status of this engagement?

We did the bidding process in early fall, and I think we started in November of 2016, and the site was finished by February.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What evidence can you share that demonstrates the impact of the engagement?

I don’t have any number I can share at the moment, but I can tell you that when I talk to other professionals in my field, they really like our website.

How did BTown Web perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management is very good. They would meet with us every once in awhile. They would talk to us about the project timeline, and what was coming up.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Chad [Founder at BTown Web] takes a lot of ownership and responsibility of the process. They value providing a good product, and it comes through in the product and the service they deliver.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Not that I can think of. I think that we’re just such a small organization that it’s hard for us to keep up sometimes with when they need information. But I think that they were really good about being patient with us.