Fixstacks

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the president of a software development and consulting company, Lone Star Media.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We hired Fixstacks to help us migrate from Magento 1 to Magento 2.

SOLUTION

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

We selected Fixstacks after interviewing a number of candidates. Fixstacks experience, customer feedback and number of completed Magento migrations is the primary reason we selected Fixstacks.

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

Magento 2 is a complete rebuild of the Magento framework so in order to migrate we pretty much needed to start over. Fixstacks assisted us in rebuilding our theme and products pages then migrated all of the date into the new system. The primary techologies where PHP and SQL.

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

We would primarily with two people. Ihor Panasiuk was the project manager and Pasichnik Roman was our lead developer.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The site migration was completed on time. The communication with the team was excellent each step of the way. We utilized Jira to make sure that our project was on track and met continually throughout the project to measure the deliverables and evaluate our status.

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

As I mentioned before, we used Jira for this project. We also utilized Slack on a daily bases for communication. Even with the time difference between Austin and Ukraine there was never an issue with getting communication on a regular basis.

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

Their ability to take a high-level task and to completed it on time and on budget. There were some challenges from the client that continually delayed the launch but Fixstacks was patient and worked with us on each step of the way.

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

Nope. It was a pleasure working with them and we will work together again

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Director of an online retailer in Australia.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

Our website had been managed by another team whpo introduced a lot of bugs. We have regular high traffic sales and the website was unstable.

SOLUTION

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

Searched online, found Fixtacks and reached out to them. Also asked for and contacted several referees.

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

Fixstacks took control of the codebase, fixed problems in the code and set up a new and advanced server stack on AWS with many instances, load balancing etc. They also set up full page caching etc.

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

I worked mainly with the lead developer Roman, but there we several others on the team. Ihor project management and other team members for testing etc.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our website became around 10x as fast to first byte, many bugs were fixed and the site became stable under high traffic loads.

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

We communicated via Skype and Fixtacks used Jira to keep a good control of the project and timelines.

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

We were really impressed with their technical skills and speed with Magento and AWS.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Fixstacks are on the other side of the world from me, but they do cater to customers globally and adjust working hours to suit. I was able to call Roman at maybe 3am his time and always got a reponse when needed.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the owner of a promotional company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Fixstacks?

Our Magento was outdated and we needed an update. It had several bugs, performance issues, and it had a low Google ranking.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They fixed the bugs on our site, brought it up to date, closed our security issues, and made it faster. Additionally, if we needed something added to the site, they helped us make small changes.

What is the team composition?

We worked with a project manager and a developer.

How did you come to work with Fixstacks?

We found them on a freelancer platform and interviewed them. We gave them a small project to accomplish. They completed it to our satisfaction, and then we gave them a larger project from there.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $10,000–$25,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in September 2019, and we wrapped up in March 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The quality is impeccable, which is why we continue to work with them. We did as much as we could do with our current site.

How did Fixstacks perform from a project management standpoint?

We used Jira for project management. They’re very accessible, and we’ve never had an issue contacting them or getting deliverables.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their availability was impressive, despite our time difference. It was refreshing.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, nothing comes to mind.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

My advice is to define what you want to do because if you don’t define what you want to do, you’re not going to do it well.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Accesorios Center is a company dedicated to the sale of technological accessories

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We have hired them to build a Magento 2 marketplace

SOLUTION

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

I have known him for recommendations and what I like the most is his dedication to the work they do, they have experience with Magento and they solve everything, it is a very dedicated team and customer service is special

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

our project was based on Magento technology, with cloud servers. from the beginning they did everything very fluid and practical. I feel very satisfied

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

The entire team worked from the model to delivery, through development and problem solving, a work scheme was formed from the beginning, which made it possible to advance in an orderly manner, until the end.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I can share my website, verifiable in its operation and load, really very powerful

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

Regarding punctuality, there were delays in some cases but resolved in a reasonable time, with respect to communication a work scheme was put together and everything was projected by the manager for this type of Kamban-style work

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

I want to emphasize that it is a company with great seriousness and knowledge, what impressed me the most was the treatment we had, they made us feel very comfortable, it is really good to find people like that to work, beyond the service they offer

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

From our experience I do not see that they have to make changes in their work structure

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the VP of products and innovation in a growing image CDN company

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

Goal was to develop a plugin to enable magento users to easily enable CDN services for their images.

SOLUTION

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

Based on online profile, a few where shortlisted and based on ease of communication, reliability and proactiveness they were all evaluated.

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

Magento is an Ecommerce platform (Adobe) built in php. The project was specified and the deliverable was a plugin which could be distributed on the Magento marketplace or installed locally. The final module would rewrite image references to point to the ImageEngine version.

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

two, Project manager and developer

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Some clients are using the module in production, but no measurable numbers are available

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

Calls and chats via Skype was very effective. Quick to respond and communication was smooth.

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

Quick to respond on Skype. Proactiveness about suggesting improvements to the product

Are there any areas for improvement?

probably, but for small projects/task like this, responsiveness and availability is key. This we are satisfied with.