Cieden

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

We are a financial services company, which provides next-gen banking services to retail and institutional clients. I work as a Product Manager there.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

We wanted to do an in-depth research of some of our competitors. 

What were your goals for this project?

Get UX flows of the different competitive products.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We found them on Upwork, asked them a few pre-qualifying questions and then we did an over the phone interview in order to see whether their process matched what we looked for.

Describe the project in detail.

We wanted to do an in-depth research of some of our competitors. This included mapping their UX flows, as well as video recordings of the products' behaviors.

What was the team composition?

A project manager who kicked started the process and two people who worked on the UX reasearch and business research.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They successfully mapped close to 10 UX flows of competitors, this allows us to use them as a reference when we think of new services. 2 new projects have already benefited from this intelligence.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

It was very easy to kick-start the process. The people from cieden were quite flexible in terms of the way we can structure out communication. I really enjoyed working with them. They delivered a high quality work at a great speed.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I really liked the professionalism and speed that they showed.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Nothing I can think of right now.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m starting a wellness business that’s focused on the app store. I’m trying to provide an alternative for people seeking wellness outside of meditation. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cieden?

I want to build a wellness app, and Cieden focuses on the UX/UI components of it. Initially, the scope was to provide an MVP. I wanted to translate my idea into high-fidelity mockups to show people.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

I work with Iryna (Co-Founder, Cieden) daily, and she works with her team to solve the various problems I have. In the beginning, I didn’t have a real clear conception of what I was building, and they’ve been instrumental is wrestling with different ideas. 

It’s an iterative, back-and-forth process. I’ll bring an idea for an aspect of the app (maybe I’ll provide PowerPoint slides). Then, I’ll talk to users and come back with a different version. 

Now, they’re putting the finishing touches on the app. Then, we’re going to send it over to my engineers to start building it. Then, I’ll bring the MVP to the market, put it into people’s hands, and learn what people think of it. We’ll do another round of updates after that. 

In subsequent months, I’m expecting Cieden to help me understand the initial data that comes back from users and iterate based on that.

What is the team composition?

One hundred percent of the communication goes through Iryna. Daria (UX/UI Designer, Cieden) is the principal designer. 

How did you come to work with Cieden?

I got lucky. My business partner, who has an even longer-term relationship with Iryna, recommended Cieden. I started with her three years ago. 

Through various projects, I’ve only principally used her for ideation and initial work toward an MVP. 

How much have you invested with them?

I’ve invested about $28,500 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

She’s been working on the project with me for about seven months. We started working on it in April of 2018, and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

In two months, I’ll have an app on the app store. Iryna has been very good at the entire product process, and I’ve been very happy. This is the first time over the last three years where we’re going to push past an MVP.

Iryna has a team of designers that can translate my thoughts, dreams, and aspirations into Photoshop files that my engineers can use. People have complimented their designs based on their aesthetic appeal and how easy they are to understand.

Also, they provide great value for what they charge. She is capable of producing a “San Francisco” quality of work at about 20% of the rate. 

How did Cieden perform from a project management standpoint?

We use Skype most of the time, and we also use InVision (it allows us to click through app screens using a phone). We also use Miro board, which is effectively a big board of post-it notes that holds all of our documents. 

Iryna is incredibly responsive and hardworking. There are times when I’ve been talking to her, an hour passes, and it’s around 8 p.m. or 9 p.m. her time. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Since I chose the team based on a recommendation from my business partner, I can’t tell you how they stack up to other people. 

From what I’ve seen, they are extremely hardworking, and they’re good at changing things around. They’ve never gotten upset when I’ve changed the requirements of their work. They are very easy to work with. Also, Iryna speaks English extremely well, and that removes a lot of overhead.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They’ve been pretty perfect for what I need. The only thing is, they’re always trying to cross-sell their services. So, I’ve had to push that back a few times and say, “I’m just interested in this.” They offer quite a bit of services, so they’ve tried to position a few different things to sell.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Potential customers should work with Iryna. She’s the founder of the firm, and they have a good amount of people working there, but I’ve never been pushed to a junior employee. 

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a product manager for a non-profit company based in US. I

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

We hired Cieden to review the UI for our tele-health app, recommend changes and redesign the application interface as applicable

What were your goals for this project?

The goals of the project was to improve the user experience for our end users and make the application more user friendly.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

Vendor responded to our project posting on Upwork. They were selected after interview.

Describe the project in detail.

We gave the vendor a demo to our application and provided them access to the app. The vendor reviewed the app and initially provided ideas for improvement in a textual list. These were discussed over video call and we agreed with the ideas that made sense.

These ideas were turned in to wireframes and multiple options were presented by vendor as application. The agreed upon wireframes were then turned in to high fidelity mockups.The mockups contained both desktop and mobile variants.

What was the team composition?

From our end, it was mainly me leading the project and interacting with vendor. I gathered feedback on designs from internal team members and passed them on to the vendor. From the vendor side, it Iryna - their CEO leading the project. She attended all the meetings and passed us UI designs.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We were satisfied with the overall pace of work as well as the quality. Vendor finished the project in around 2 months, communicated new ideas well and patiently incorporated changes during multiple iteration rounds.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Everything worked pretty well.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Vendor's CEO personally led the project and I felt we were given full attention during the project.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I am satisfied with the work.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Fiksuruoka.fi is a Finnish e-commerce company selling surplus patches of food online. Our goal is to reduce the amount of food waste in the world by selling cheap food online.

As the CMO of Fiksuruoka, my responsibilities include everything marketing related. My team is also responsible for our website development projects and service design.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

We hired Cieden to help with our website facelift project. Cieden's responsibility was to design a new UI for our webstore and improve the visual look and feel of the website. We also wanted help to improve the UX of the website.

In the end Cieden ended up doing a lot more than we expected and the website designs had a huge impact on the overall brand and visual style of Fiksuruoka.

What were your goals for this project?

Improve the visual look of the website and the usability.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We selected Cieden as they stood out from many other companies that we also interviewed. Cieden understood our needs very well and their communication was excellent. They also had relevant references that we liked.

Describe the project in detail.

We started with few pages to find the overall style for the design. We liked the style Cieden suggested and after we began to build all the pages with mobile-first design.

At first we figured we need to explain what we need with wireframes, but after couple pages we noticed that Cieden can understand our needs very well and there was no need for wireframing.

The whole website was redesigned with +30 different pages in desktop and mobile sizes. The quality of the designs was really good and Cieden was always very open to any changes if there was need for it because of user feedback or some other reason.

What was the team composition?

Cieden had Katya and Nazar in the team + a illustrator helping with some small illustrations. We had 3-4 persons from marketing and development teams in contact with Cieden giving feedback on the designs and technical feasibility.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The designs have got very good feedback from customers and our team is really happy with the results.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Very good communication through Slack and weekly calls. We told Cieden what kind of designs we need and they came up with the designs.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The quality of the designs and very good communication stood out.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I can't think of any.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Co-Founder and CEO at Whim Technologies, a company that powers the logistics behind event and lifestyle brands through a diverse array of services that include automated ticketing, payment plans processing, guest list management, marketing, and more.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

I initially approached Cieden with the need to improve our current technical and operational processes while also building out additional capabilities and service lines for our clients in the future. I liked how Cieden quickly understood our needs and adapted all of their different services right away to solve our unique issues.

They’re now helping us out with everything from auditing our business processes and suggesting changes to our feature roadmap, to documentation of everything and designing the prototypes.

What were your goals for this project?

Our main goal for this year is to become a better version of ourselves. Cieden has quite impressively turned this goal into a series of tangible KPIs and efforts that we’re now working towards.

The three main areas of effort are improving our current SaaS product, improving our operational processes, and building on our business strategy to expand and diversify our revenue streams.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We were evaluating a few agencies, but felt very comfortable with the call we had with Cieden and the subsequent proposal we received. We felt like we’d be in good hands.

Describe the project in detail.

Cieden has so far audited all of our existing platform’s functionality, along with our wireframes and plans for near-term future product expansion.

They’ve concurrently worked on understanding our business operations to identify areas to automate, thereby improving efficiencies and leaving our team more time to focus on other things.

And finally, they’ve worked with us over a series of calls to better understand our business climate and future goals, helping us better organize ourselves to expand into additional service areas. Everything has been documented very thoroughly, and now we’re moving into the design phase.

Next steps will be to test our assumptions with user testing and additional customer interviews, and I’m sure at that point we will discover more ways to keep iterating on our products and business processes together.

What was the team composition?

A business analyst and a director of growth are our main points of contact, and through them I understand that we have a team of designers and other analysts helping us out.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We have never so clearly understood both where we’re at and where we’re going. That in itself is extremely helpful, and it’s shedding light into more areas that we can improve on.

Additionally, we’re already implementing some of the work they’ve provided to us, which is drastically improving how we onboard new clients.

My business partner and I are both quite impressed at how Cieden is providing way more than just business analysis or designs for us. They’re fundamentally improving the way we do business and in ways that we’re already able to act on.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Things are pretty smooth. We have a shared Slack channel and have pretty regular check in calls.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

What we love most about Cieden is that they fundamentally understand business. The value they provide goes way above and beyond good product design or mapping out requirements.

For example, they obviously understand the importance of good software, but they also understand that software in and of itself is not the full picture. Improving our operations, business strategy, and brand strategy are equally important, and Cieden is able to help in these areas as well.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I will have to think about that. Love their work-product thus far.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the operations manager at PLAYR.gg, a viral marketing growth platform startup that works within the video game streaming industry. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cieden?

We reached out to Cieden for UX/UI design of our mockups in collaboration with our product team to visualize some concepts we were discussing. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cieden is developing the UX/UI of marketing platform mockups, using Sketch and Zeppelin to share their designs with our team. 

What is the team composition? 

We primarily work with Yuriy (Competence Manager, Cieden). 

How did you come to work with Cieden?

The company was already working with them when I came onboard, but I believe they found them on UpWork. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working with them since around May 2018 and the relationship is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

So far, the project is progressing very well and the quality of their work is solid. They've incorporated any feedback or changes we've had, making improvements to the UX/UI along the way. 

How did Cieden perform from a project management standpoint?

The entire process has been seamless. Yuriy has done a good job of working within our existing proejct management software and ensuring everything is on track. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They're responsive and dedicated to helping us be successful. As a startup, a lot of our time is required to accomplish what we need to do to be successful, and they understand that. Yuriy has invested a lot of time to thoroughly understand our project requirements, lending his expertise where appropriate to improve product outcomes. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Some of the mockups they've provided have been inconsistent with our style guide or the text has been different from what we submitted, so there's room for improvement in terms of QA. 

I'd also love to see them get off of UpWork to improve their payment structure for both themselves and their clients. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Provide a lot of clarity around project expectations and make sure their team can meet those needs before getting started. 

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I was working as a freelance product manager at Language Tools, a language learning platform.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

I hired Cieden to give the Language Tools website a new look.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted a more contemporary look, and we also wanted to update our messaging to distinguish ourselves from our competitors. Additionally, we wanted to improve our mobile experience.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

I interviewed three designers and liked the Cieden team and their responses. They immediately had ideas about how to approach the project. I also liked that they clearly had a set process.

Describe the project in detail.

We had a kick-off conversation and then worked on a discovery brief. From there, we created a project plan and prioritized screens to be worked on. I provided the copy which was incorporated into the design. When the pages were ready, I reviewed them and provided feedback and brought the updates to the larger team for more feedback. That’s how it went for several rounds. Feedback was well received, and the team at Cieden was not afraid to push for things they felt strongly about, which I admired. The deliverables were handed off to our internal development team quite smoothly.

What was the team composition?

I mostly worked directly with the designer, bit we would consult with the account team occasionally.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

No data is available as of yet.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

It was very effective.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They were responsive and easy to work with, not to mention skilled.

Are there any areas for improvement?

They were unable to offer any development support, but I knew that going in so it wasn't an issue.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of a car subscription platform that allows users to take out company cars instead of buying or leasing one. These companies can also provide driving services to our subscribers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cieden?

We engaged Cieden to redesign our website and create a professional design for our mobile app.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

After redesigning our website, they focused on the UI/UX for our mobile app. They created the designs from scratch using Zeplin and currently continue to make minor improvements as needed.

What is the team composition?

Their team consists of 4–5 members, including a project manager, senior designers, and junior designers.

How did you come to work with Cieden?

I found them on Upwork and liked their professional approach. They had a real understanding of how design relates to function, and the CEO was very knowledgeable.

What is the status of this engagement?

Their work started in January 2018 and is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Overall, we’ve received great feedback from customers. The designs are clean, simple, and beautiful.

How did Cieden perform from a project management standpoint?

They communicate clearly and deliver good results in a timely fashion. We don’t need a lot of back and forth because they do things right the first time. Not to mention, they’re always responsive.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Besides being customer-friendly, they have a great sense of style. Their grasp of design versus functionality is key.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can’t think of any improvements. They’ve done a great job.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Trust their judgment and let them do their job.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the founding partner of a client-side product management consultancy that procures technology for startups and businesses that aren't tech-savvy.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

We wanted to dramatically improve user experience and conversation rates through a multichannel retail sales funnel. We planned a complete overhaul of the existing website, which didn't meet sales expectations.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to transform a high-end furniture retailer from a traditional model into a digital, multichannel model.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We chose them based on their location, the availability of their designers, their knowledge of the multichannel retail business model, and their commitment to a successful design implementation.

Describe the project in detail.

We introduced Cieden to our client and supplied input documentation to ensure that they adequately captured the product vision. Cieden worked side-by-side with our client to deliver a highly functional, aesthetically appealing design that embedded best practices of the multichannel model.

What was the team composition?

Their UX designer and design lead consulted on the project. Other designers supported them, expanding their capacity and accelerating the progress.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our client was more than satisfied with the designs, and our developers could easily implement them using Shopify. Their approach to the furniture mood board exceeded our expectations, and they brought a range of new concepts to the table. Overall, they did a great job with a demanding brief and high client expectations.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Unfortunately, they couldn't use proper project management tools because of resistance from our client. This made tracking progress difficult. However, their designers made special efforts to accommodate our client's needs.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their commitment to our client's expectations was unshakable. They treated this project with the utmost respect and gave it the attention it deserved. The result was an outstanding, aesthetically magnificent website.

Are there any areas for improvement?

They should have managed client expectations better and utilized rigorous internal and external project management processes. Those tools would have avoided scope creep and seep, even among an older generation that isn't accustomed to them.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

We’re an application development company that creates web and mobile apps for a variety of clients. I run and manage a number of our projects.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Cieden?

We've used Cieden for a number of our web and mobile projects to create the UI/UX experience.

What were your goals for this project?

To provide a great UI on both the design and the usability sides of our application. We wanted a firm that could provide a great experience on both the web and mobile platforms.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We interviewed a number of companies and looked at their portfolios. Cieden completed a small project for us, which they did excellently. After that, they became our go-to partner for UI/UX work.

Describe the project in detail.

The project to build a large, financial-based application that had to fulfill a number of roles, for both internal and external users. We needed a UI/UX approach that addressed these needs while offering a user-friendly, beautiful design for them. Cieden delivered on all of those goals.

What was the team composition?

The team included our internal developers, who worked closely with the designers at Cieden.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Cieden did a great job on both the design and usability sides. The outcome of the project was very successful thanks to their great work. They made sure that it’s not only beautiful but very easy to use.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Our teams worked very well together.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They’re very responsive to feedback and are easy to work with. Their team is transparent with their estimates and the effort required to complete the job.

Are there any areas for improvement?

There are none at this time.