Digital Elevator

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

My name is Eddie Lester and I'm the CEO of Fitness Mentors (www.fitnessmentors.com), which helps trainers develop their personal training careers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Digital Elevator?

Increasing my company's mostly non-existent Google presence. Another key challenge was making sure that the website is up to par.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They built a new WordPress website, and created an email marketing strategy. For the website, I gave them a basic idea of what I wanted and they brought that vision to life.

The team also did an analysis about the company’s competitors on Google. They are providing ongoing SEO [search engine optimization] services, as well as site maintenance.

What is the team dynamic?

My main contact is Daniel [E. Lofaso, President & Founder, Digital Elevator]. I have also worked with a few other employees.

How did you come to work with Digital Elevator?

Daniel sent me a message on Instagram because he noticed we both worked with surfers. We had a call to discuss what kind of work my company needed, and then I spoke to a few other other companies as well. I had the best feeling—a sense of common ground—with him, and decided to move forward.

What is the status of this engagement?

Work started in April 2015. They continue to provide ongoing site maintenance and SEO work, and we're discussing a redesign for the website.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Taken all together, their work has helped increase my revenue by 1000%. In terms of Google ranking, they were able to make the company the top search result for all of our keywords within six months of launching the SEO plan.

The new website has been very effective. The layout is very simple and clean, which is what I was looking for.

How did Digital Elevator perform from a project management standpoint?

Daniel is awesome. He is very patient, especially with a client that doesn’t know much about online marketing. Very easygoing and personable.

He’s readily available. Deadlines are kept, and he’s clear about what to expect throughout the process.

What did you find most impressive about them?

A strong sense of honesty is very impressive. Being personable and having good communication skills is another core strength. They have the patience and ability to explain what is being done, why, and the potential benefits to the business. And then they very effectively perform the work and deliver those benefits.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the head of marketing at DuvaSawko, an organization that provides revenue cycle management for emergency medicine physician groups by way of billing and coding.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Digital Elevator?

Our company has existed and excelled on a word of mouth for a long time. We didn't have valuable content on our website, so we were looking for someone to help us build strong content and direct traffic to the website. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We're a niche business and most of our sales take 3–6 months, so it was important to deliver the right content to our prospective clients. Digital Elevator positioned us as subject matter experts in the industry, changed some design elements on our website, making the "call to action" more visible, and added pages for various services we offer. They also emphasized the specific areas around the revenue cycle management that matter to our clients.

They continue doing digital marketing and writing blog posts for us.

What is the team dynamic?

Most of the time I work with Dan [Daniel E. Lofaso, President and Founder, Digital Elevator]. I also speak with some members of his team, usually when they need clarification or additional insights from us. Everyone is very personable. 

How did you come to work with them?

I worked with Dan in the past. I knew he is very capable when it comes to finding a distinct match between our services and what our prospects are looking for when they go online, so I was confident in hiring him.

How much have you invested with them?

We spend around $2,000 a month.

What is the status of this engagement? 

We started working with them in October 2016, and we continue working together.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The digital imprint they're making brings us more clients. Since we're a niche business, we don't have a plethora of people knocking on our doors. Driving traffic to our website and having valuable content helps people who need our services find us.

How did they perform from a project management standpoint? 

They're very responsive, never miss deadlines, and report the progress. We had no communication issues. They use Basecamp, and everything is transparent. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Dan is very frank with us, offers feedback, and brings new perspectives. I'm comfortable doing business with them because of their high level of expertise. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the CEO and a co-founder of Allocable. We’re a software as a service company that provides time tracking, business intelligence, and human resource management in the cloud.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Digital Elevator.

We have a sufficient team on the product development side, but we were lacking resources on the marketing and sales side. It was too costly to hire staff, so we started looking for a digital marketing and SEO vendor to help build our brand and extend our reach.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

D.E. originally agreed to help with SEO and content strategy, mostly to help build up content on our blog. We had a lot of need since we had no staff in that area of the business so they ended up taking on much more work to help us out. Our software is one of the more innovative products in the market and there is not a lot of content about our core technology – predictive intelligence and scenario planning analytics. At first, it was difficult for the D.E. team to help create blog posts, content, and white papers because the subject matter was so technically scientific in nature. They did a great job of researching and working with me to put relevant content out there.

What is the team dynamic?

My relationship was with the founder, Dan [President, Digital Elevator], but I also worked with Rob [CTO, Digital Elevator] who acted as our project manager. Over the course of the time we worked together, there were always at least 2 people dedicated to us, sometimes more. If we had a big push to create a lot of content, complete web work, and SEO at the same time, they would bring on additional resources depending on our needs.

How did you come to work with Digital Elevator?

I'm a member of the Palm Beach Technology Association and I met Dan through the association. I had heard a lot of great things about him and his business. I reached out to him and 4 other vendors which I interviewed; some of the vendors were large marketing agencies in Boston or New York, and I chose D.E. because of the proximity to my location. I wanted to work with a local expert. Also, secondary, because he was also a member of the Palm Beach Technology Association.

How much have you invested with them?

We started off with a budget of $2,000 per month for the content creation and SEO strategies. When we started doing more PPC and retargeting that went along with our digital marketing strategy, we started spending over $6,500 per month.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in October 2016, and the engagement is ongoing. We’re actually selling our company, and I’ve cut spending on almost everything except for Digital Elevator because they are that valuable to us.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They’ve been highly effective. Dan’s been coaching me on how to write better blog posts and white papers as well as helping me truly understand the SEO KPI’s that are the most important for a business like ours. Because of our combined efforts, at one point, we experienced a 211% increase in new business over a 3 month period.

We had measurable progress in SEO every month. It took a little while in the beginning because of how long it takes to get indexed and make any traction, but we started to see an increase every month.

How did Digital Elevator perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re very responsive. It was super helpful when they added Rob as an additional project manager. Whenever I had tasks I couldn’t fulfill with my own team, they would jump in and take care of it for me.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They provide a highly boutique customer experience, and they are very knowledgeable about the right things at the right times for a business to do. Best of all, they treat you like family. They actually care very much about your success. It was clear in the way they managed me and the project.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It would be nice to see them add additional services, such illustrations, infographics, and video. I had to go elsewhere to outsource those things, and it would have been great to get it all in one place.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you run a small company like ours and can afford it, I suggest bringing on a marketing focused resource, that has worked in multichannel marketing to help coordinate the day-to-day tasks associated with digital marketing and working with a vendor like Digital Elevator. There are a lot of moving parts and it moves fast. It is easy to get behind.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Right Lawyers is a divorce attorney with locations in Nevada and California.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We just opened the office in San Diego. We hired Digital Elevator to provide an SEO audit and gameplan for ranking in the San Diego Market

SOLUTION

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

We hired them after watching a Youtube video they created explaining SEO in multiple cities.

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

We wanted a full audit of our SEO in San Diego. The audit would show our strengths, weaknesses and opportunities.

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

2

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They did an excellent job on the audit. Very thorough analysis.

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

Always timely. Monthly reporting was always on time.

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

How detailed their audit and strategies were. They understood SEO at a technical legal and user level.

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

None