App & Flow

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a financial institution called Point Up Inc, and I am the co-founder of the company. We are a branchless bank, which means that we are completely online in order to provide a more streamlined operation and better customer experience to our users.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with App & Flow Development?

Being online-only, it was critical for us to have a really great app that would serve all of our customers’ needs, and we worked with App & Flow Development to build the entire customer-facing side of the app and all of its features from scratch on both iOS and Android.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

As a one-stop-shop for our customers, we needed the app to be feature-rich while also being very simple and easy to use for things like money transfers, payments, account signups, and anything else you could do with a normal bank.

We provided wireframes and documentation, and they developed the frontend on React Native so that we could deploy to both iOS and Android at the same time. From there, they integrated all of the features into the backend, and we are now testing and tweaking the early beta application.

What is the team composition?

Over the course of the last year, we’ve worked with four people at different points in time. There are two people actively coding right now, and then we have a project manager and one other point of contact on their team.

How did you come to work with App & Flow Development?

One of my co-founders had worked with their team on a different application, and I first came into contact with App & Flow Development through him. We talked through our idea and requirements with them and decided that they would be a good fit.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent somewhere around $100,000 in total.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started the project in April 2019 and our work with them is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

On the surface level, obviously, having the frontend of our application in place is very important. The fact that we were able to get it up and running fairly quickly and to a good standard of quality was really positive. Their team is extremely responsive to any issues that come up and does a good job of proactively addressing those.

The app has received a lot of good feedback so far, so we are very happy with the quality of work that they’ve provided. People seem to be very passionate about what features they use and what they want to see as we continue to develop and roll out the application.

How did App & Flow Development perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve established a really good workflow at this stage between testing, getting feedback, and making improvements. Their project management has been good overall because of the efforts on communication from both sides. As with any young company, we’ve had growing pains in establishing feedback flows and structure, but we’ve made good progress.

We rely on Slack a lot for our daily back and forth, and then we have phone calls and twice-weekly check-ins to make sure everybody is on the same page. We try to keep things simple, so we generally limit meetings to an hour to set and evaluate priorities and then move on.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The thing I’ve been most impressed by is their willingness to take on feedback and address it. They take constructive criticism well and implement meaningful solutions in a really valuable way. That willingness to communicate goes a long way.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Some of the initial difficulties that we had with communication did cause project delays that we would have hoped to avoid. I’d rather be told a longer and more accurate timeline to begin with than have to readjust the schedule if things don’t go perfectly the first time. They’ve already done work to improve on this, which I appreciate.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They’re great to work with. Just be very specific in your direction — the more detail you can provide, the more smoothly things will go.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CTO of Fixit Financial, an app where users obtain car repair loans electronically. They go through electronic identification, VIN validation, and an origination process before being uploaded into a loan management system. It’s a web-based interfaced with a few portals for users and administrators.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with App & Flow Development?

I built the MVP myself and coded it to demonstrate to investors and interested folks. After I’d locked down funding and needed to get production done, I hired his team of engineers to refine the product and get it ready for the market.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

I gave them access to a repository of code I built, as well as wireframes and flow diagrams and I created and envisioned. Then, they produced a cross-platform mobile app in React Native using an Expo framework. Once they understood the flow of the solution, they refactored quite a bit of the code and API maps I’d done to make them more scalable and professional. They have excellent coders that are solid on best practices and giving tutorials.

What is the team composition?

We worked with 2–3 developers.

How did you come to work with App & Flow Development?

They were a reference from a traditional web design firm we spoke to. After they said they would need an astronomical fee to use my original code, they recommended Charles. I talked to him and decided to move forward.

How much have you invested with them?

I spent $100,000 CAD ($75,600 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from January until December 2018. The app launched in July 2018, and the rest of the time they were on a support and maintenance contract.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Their work was indispensable to a successful launch. When I built the MVP, I had some idea of stringing APIs together, but they added an element of professionalism and troubleshooting I couldn’t do myself. The challenges went above and beyond my technical expertise. They were absolutely necessary to getting the project launched.

There was lots of troubleshooting (issues with cross-platform development always require unique tweaks), and on the day of the launch, Google’s servers went down. This was beyond their control, but they were very responsive. They were accessible at all times too, even though they had other projects going on.  

How did App & Flow Development perform from a project management standpoint?

I underestimated the work involved, but it was no fault of Charles and his team. There were issues with the API and the integration with them and our partners, but no delays were due to App & Flow.

I very much enjoyed the process. We had Slack for communication, and they seemed like they lived there—days, nights, weekends, and holidays. We also had a Trello-like interface where we could see tasks that were being worked on. I felt integrated as a part of the team.

What did you find most impressive about them?

There’s a factor of being in the same city and time zone. I went to their office a few times to work together. It was much more pleasant than working with the overseas folks I’ve outsourced to in past.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s hard for me to pinpoint anything exactly because they provided a weekly report. I don’t have much criticism. If I had any issues or didn’t understand something, Chris would explain it. The main engineer was accessible and responsive as well.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They’re open to explaining how things work, but it helped that I had a technical background. I felt I learned a lot from observing and participating in their process. Soak up as much knowledge as possible and set up a communication channel.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder/CEO of a mobile app for consumers and businesses.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with App & Flow?

We needed help with frontend development. We worked on the interface with another company that was underperforming. We wanted a new agency to take over development and design.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They built a frontend in React Native for both Android and iOS. We gave them ideas of what we wanted to achieve and they made refinements. The app itself has some cool features. Everything is very detailed and fully transparent for users.

They also set up data analytics to give us insight on user preferences and put is in contact with third-party vendors that offer additional services.

What is the team composition?

We work with two people directly, and a third team member is involved behind the scenes. Our project manager and developer share responsibilities and their roles overlap somewhat.

How did you come to work with App & Flow?

Our first interaction was on Facebook. They’re clear communicators and were transparent from the very beginning.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in November 2017. They will provide ongoing development work for at least a few more months.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’re still in development, so there are no clear KPIs yet. We're extremely pleased with the quality of the work, their speed, and their communicativeness. They’re super reactive and push to eliminate bugs early. They make changes based on our feedback.

How did App & Flow perform from a project management standpoint?

The CEO/project manager is an incredible communicator. He understands our issues and is good at problem solving. We communicate by phone, email, or in person and they address our questions quickly via GitHub. They’re very easy to do business with.

They aligned with our schedule and we meet every other week. They’re flexible, know our expectations, and deliver high-quality work.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Communication and ownership of the product have been strong since the beginning. They provide great recommendations and feedback and are willing to lead parts of the project. They can interact with the designer and give directions without our intervention and are extremely professional.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We’ve had a really good experience and there’s very little we’d improve. As they grow, their capacity becomes more flexible, but we would still like more bandwidth to accelerate some of the components of the product.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Take advantage of their communication style and their openness. Share your expectations and ask questions. They’re very good at understanding your perspective and handling your issues. They will provide a clear agenda and make you feel comfortable.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am one of the co-founders of Fittcoach and their Head of Product

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire App & Flow Development, and what were your goals?

We hired App & Flow to help us create a robust mobile experience as the company was pivoting to a mobile-first customer journey. App & Flow helped us develop an end-to-end solution that would provide our users with a seamless experience across any mobile device.

SOLUTION

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

We spoke with several other agencies but chose App & Flow because of their experience and level of care. They worked with us as thought partners and really tried to understand our business and what would be best for our users.

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

App and Flow developed an iOS and Android app. We first started by scoping the project, discussing key features and integrations and then layering in the best UI for users. Key deliverables included the mobile apps, integration with Stripe, a web-based dashboard to manage the business and provide analytics.

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

The team size changed over time but typically two key folks worked with us. On was on the Project Management side and the other on the Development side.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The app has been a massive success with our users and we've grown to over 10K users in less than a year with fast growing GMV and revenue. We migrated ~90% of our web-based users over to the mobile experience and feedback from users on their experience was up ~60%

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

We primarily used Slack and Google Suite to manage communication, share documents. The team was very transparent with timelines and would always provide multiple options and tradeoffs associated (i.e. more complex vs. quick fix)

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

I found their attention to detail and support for problem-solving very helpful. We would discuss the end goal and the App & Flow team always had several options and solutions available. They were also very friendly to work with and would always be available to answer questions or provide support

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

Nothing really - we're very happy with the work we've done together. Moving forward, we hope to continue working with the App & Flow team and having our next round of product features completed.