HyperArts

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm a senior administrator at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with HyperArts?

We had an ongoing need for web design and development services for various projects.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

HyperArts provides development services for various sized projects from start to finish. They help us understand client requirements to properly scope out the work, and then provide web design and development as needed while working with a large amount of scientific data. They've also assisted with the design of logos and scientific publications, uploading them onto online databases, and making them searchable by various criteria. Most of the web projects use WordPress, but they also have expertise with Drupal. 

What is the team composition? 

We work with a project manager, a developer, and a designer.

How did you come to work with HyperArts?

We were already working with them when I came into the role, but I believe they were chosen based on their experience with scientific projects and the fact that they're local. 

How much have you invested with them?

We've negotiated a $150,000 budget with them over the next several years.

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working with them for about five years and counting.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Making our publications accessible to the public has been an enormous success, and we've received a lot of positive feedback at conferences on them. They get high marks for being professional, responsive to our needs, and flexible in working around a bureaucratic financial system. Overall, they offer valuable services. 

How did HyperArts perform from a project management standpoint?

As a certified project manager, I think HyperArts is excellent in this area. They work very effectively; we don't have to worry about any of the details, and their deliverables are always on time. They're great about working with our procurement process and are very responsive in all forms of communication, touching base with us throughout each project. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I mostly appreciate their project management, the overall quality of their work, and their responsiveness to our needs. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can't think of anything. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Don't be afraid to ask them for help when it comes to defining client requirements. As a scientific institution, web design is outside of our wheelhouse, but their team has been able to help us scope out projects for clients as needed.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a hospital quality improvement and patient safety consulting firm.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with HyperArts?

Our president operates a public reporting initiative for hospitals. We engaged HyperArts to build our website for the initiative along with a background database.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The previous iteration of our website belonged to a different company before we took ownership. We wanted to overhaul the site to be easier to use with a more robust database. HyperArts created a complex background database that allows us to feed hospital quality data from a variety of sources into our WordPress site. I joined the project after the design phase, so I'm not sure what the entire project scope was. But they may have also assisted with the design elements.

What is the team composition?

I worked with two main members of their team who provided all the resources I needed.

How did you come to work with HyperArts?

I wasn’t involved in the hiring process. HyperArts may have been a vendor with the foundation we grew out of and were referred to us through them.

How much have you invested with them?

Our total expenditure was around $150,000, but that may include our staffing costs.

What is the status of this engagement?

The planning stage started in August 2016, and the project took about three months to complete.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The ease of use is amazing, and the time we spend maintaining the site is really minimal. HyperAct was always willing to help us with quick turnarounds or emergency changes that weren’t necessarily related to the scope of the project. They came through for us every time and were excellent at meeting last-minute deadlines.

How did HyperArts perform from a project management standpoint?

Our two points of contact took ownership of our website overhaul and made sure the database ran properly and was easy to update. They trained us to ensure that our staff understood how it worked. Both excelled at project management and took a lot of the pressure off of me and anyone else managing the process on our side. We used Basecamp for a lot of our file sharing and other communication.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The turnaround was very quick, and their staff was excellent at transforming our requests into practical solutions. A lot of our ideas were abstract, but they were good at troubleshooting and understanding what we wanted to accomplish.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, they’re very accommodating.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I don’t have any unique advice for potential customers, but HyperArts was very good at providing interim mockups and other cost-saving services. I would recommend them to anyone looking for that sort of assistance.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We’re part of a national laboratory that conducts complex scientific research—basic research as opposed to applied. We are government-supported and not a profit-based business.  

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with HyperArts?

The main business challenge was setting up a website for an international research network. It had to be easy and intuitive for people to use. We did have a site that provided data, but it didn't have support, instructions, or information on how things worked elsewhere. Our project started with almost no people in September 2012. It took time for us to figure out who we were.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

HyperArts built the website from scratch. Before we brought in HyperArts, we did a lot of work on branding and voice. HyperArts then took that information and leveraged it in helping us design and maintain our goals for branding and for ease of use throughout. They also have floated with us through the evolution from SharePoint to WordPress, and we’re now presenting all our information via WordPress.

HyperArts has developed several functionalities for us over time. They helped us develop a way of presenting information that’s pulled via web services from a SharePoint SQL database. They developed a whole setup of having tabs so you can go to each one. All the data in there is pulled from a SharePoint database via a web service. When you see the image gallery, that actually pulls images from the WordPress image gallery.

We have a new image gallery, and HyperArts helped us walk through the workflow so people can upload figures. That’s a WordPress database as well. It’s a simple link that allows you to download data in a serviceable manner. They helped us develop an editing tool where if you look at the bottom, it says “Edit site information.” That was a fabulous feature. We appreciate having an easy way for our users to go in and edit items. The iconography is helpful for our international users, and we’ve tried keeping the language simple for them as well.

We’ve recently changed the image gallery so you can look at only data-rich images. The photos are uploaded from our user base. You can go to them, click on them, and view them in their original size. Most of them are in high resolution, and whenever they’re downloaded, they include all of their copyright information. 

How did you come to work with HyperArts?

Initially, we had to look for a team that could handle SharePoint integration for a hybrid site. We got three companies that could bring that expertise. It was hard to find somebody who could do WordPress and SharePoint. We found HyperArts through a referral. We talked to our deputy CIO, and he told me that there were three companies that do web dev that had worked successfully with our IT department and the public affairs website, etc.  In fact, these guys qualify for California and federal small business guidelines. If a corporation is looking for a company that qualifies for small business, HyperArts is one that does.

How much have you invested with HyperArts?

We’re spending roughly $75,000 a year with HyperArts, with about $85,000 for our first big website launch. They also help us with programming support on an ongoing basis between projects. We pay them $3,200 for annual maintenance, which includes updating the plugins, testing, doing security, and backing up our site independently of the hosting company’s backup.

What is the status of this engagement?

We launched the hybrid first version in February 2014. I think the project took about six months. A lot of that had to do with the fact that we had a hybrid site. Someone had thrown up a bunch of content on a SharePoint site, so we had to create a new domain and take everything down.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

We do go to users quite a bit, which is one of the reasons we have a user interface designer, and we’ve done pretty well from our user feedback. Every time we make an advance, the users are excited because their lives get easier, or they can use something correctly the first time without asking somebody to help them. The user interface designer would have a lot of the documentation on our feedback. She sits down with our users to find out what their thinking is and where they get snagged while using the site.

Almost all of our functionalities have undergone three rounds of refinement. Our user interface designer is experienced with our scientists by now. Trying to document different figures is a little harder for me because our user interface designer has been keeping those records, but I do know that every time we roll out a new feature, we get a lot of compliments and then the occasional grumpy note. We hear about bugs quickly because people from all will start to ping us. We have one internal WordPress person who can fix some bugs, but most of that goes to HyperArts. They usually fix issues within a day, and for us, that’s really reasonable.

How did HyperArts perform from a project management standpoint?

I was the primary contact, the point person, for the project, but I had to work and pass things through committees. Having Bill Daly as a project manager was critical to getting the website launched because he was able to break things down. He’s an exceptional project manager. He brought in two programmers to work with us as well as an artist who worked on the look of the new website. He also brought in a wonderful user interface designer, which was extremely important to us because of ease of use issues. We already had a logo, so they used that and our branding and vision statements to build the visuals for the website.

HyperArts’ project management skills are one of the reasons I have such a high opinion of them. It’s hard when you're dealing with a big project like this, and you're under-resourced, you're hiring new scientists, and you're getting to know your users, and you're doing all of it on the fly. Bill was patient and he broke things down for us. He would ask, “Can we make a decision on this?” Luckily I was able to be given the authority to make certain kinds of decisions, but others I had to go back to the committee.

 HyperArts has made all of our deadlines, which has been unkind of us to demand, but they’ve been really good. Another reason why I like Bill is he would say, “Well, what you're asking for is a little more complicated than we can get delivered by this date. What could we do as a minimal viable product?” And then they always delivered on that agreed upon MVP.

Are there any areas HyperArts could improve?

I don't feel fair even citing this, but I did realize that I would like a little more obvious written documentation. But that’s on me because it’s in my contract. I haven't been going to them and saying, “Show me where it is.” I've been told by the programmers on the HyperArts side that they wish one of the programmers would document things a little more carefully. It would be good for me to know exactly how they’re documenting it in the code.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are an advanced analytics company. When I first engaged with our company, I was the marketing manager, primarily focused on communications. Now I’m the senior marketing manager encompassing our whole corporate brand.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with HyperArts?

At the time, we had just started in the commercial market. We’re a federal contractor, but we were branching into the commercial market. Commercial products and federal services have different needs in a website. We had a unique challenge in how we’re going to structure and talk about ourselves and do lead generation through the website in that way.

When I transitioned into marketing, our company had gone through several website projects yearly. Since there was no marketing team, they had a random person on contract project manage a vendor. It didn’t work very well. Because of that, there was always a need to start from scratch.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

When we started this project with HyperArts, we had just formed a new marketing team. Our CMO was hired, and we were discussing what we wanted to do to avoid having to start from scratch every single year. When we engaged with them, it was important to let them know what we don’t want, not so much what we did want. They were very helpful in taking the main body elements and assets from the previous websites and helping us come up with a strategy for moving forward.

First and foremost was the overall architecture of the website that they assisted us with. That was a pretty quick turnaround. From there, we had a new project with them every quarter or six months where we either focused on lead generation or different functionalities of the product pages. We took different user experiences and built upon the existing websites that they worked on with us. They didn’t do SEO [search engine optimization] or email marketing for us.

One of the cool things that HyperArts did is that they said this is not something that they do, but they made it happen. I needed an internal document that helps me show any stakeholders who wanted to create new pages to our website and the different functionality and layer options that we could have in layouts of different pages. Again, this was not something that helped them in the current project, but it was a tool that they created for us so that I could better internally manage a menu of styles for any new pages that needed to be created. Those were little things that we picked up along the way.

On the first project, we had one designer and project manager. On projects we had going forward, depending on the size, we had the same designer and project manager. If it was on a smaller scale, we had a different designer because the first designer worked on bigger projects. It was nice that we were able to continue to stay with the same group of people, no matter what our needs were for that specific project.

How did you come to work with HyperArts?

I am not sure where their name originally came from. Our CMO at the time was based in California, and HyperArts is a Californian company. He shortlisted companies, and I went through the RFPs [request for proposal] with them. Whenever I am sourcing for vendors, I really go with my gut. A lot of times, it’s just so close as far as the capabilities of different vendors. They can all do the same thing, but if you have people that make the project easy, that’s really where a lot of the success comes from because it’s such a fluid experience. We hit it off with HyperArts. They understood what we were asking for and offered suggestions. It was great.

How much have you invested with HyperArts?

For the website launch, it was in the $25,000 range.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our relationship with HyperArts started at the end of 2014. We launched the website a couple of years ago, and it was very clean and simple. We then started working on that website. Four months down the road, after playing with it and seeing things on other websites, I sat down and listed all the different things that we would like to accomplish and add. They would quickly whip up a proposal. Normally, it was no longer than a month and a half project cycle, and we just modeled it after the first one that we did together.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

HyperArts continues to encourage clean design and consistency. One of the challenges with us was that different marketing people from different backgrounds wanted bells and whistles on certain pages, and HyperArts was very good at reinforcing clean simplicity. That guidance has been helpful. We’ve received feedback, especially for a federal government contractor, that we have a different, clear, easy to navigate site—it’s not your normal Washington, D.C. contracting website.

Most of our lead generation came from publishing and promoting content. People would come to the website that way through inbound marketing and then fill out contact forms. HyperArts setting up our resource and blog section was important, as we need to have that foundation, but I would credit more other promotional strategies of email campaigns, social media, and the user experience to provide lead generation and contact forms.

How did HyperArts perform from a project management standpoint?

I can’t say that the functionality HyperArts added was super unique, but their value was. It’s the fact that we’re probably a tough client to have because we had two different trains of thought colliding and a lot of legacy information. They were really helpful about not shoving us into their process. They listened to us and allowed us to ask how we could work with them, and then they made it work. That is where they were awesome—in the client service part. I do not know if I can say one specific part, but the project management aspect and the way they allowed us to deal with our internal things and respond accordingly were very valuable. They also did a good job on hitting the deadlines we set out for them.

What did you find most impressive about HyperArts?

You want to do business with people that you like. I could tell that they genuinely cared about hitting the deadlines, not because they had to, but because they were invested. That, in turn, translates to knowing that they wanted to do that for me, so I also wanted to do that for them. I was more of a bulldog internally to make sure that I got that back from them. It has been my best vendor relationship to date.

They not only had me, a marketing manager, as their client, but they also worked with our IT team. Across the board in this industry, there’s always a little bit of conflict between marketing and IT. We had our own challenges there, but HyperArts handled that wonderfully. Recently, our IT person retired. Instead of hiring somebody new, we outsourced that person’s responsibilities to HyperArts because we have just enjoyed working with them.

Are there any areas HyperArts could improve?

If we had given HyperArts the runway, they would have done more. When we first started with the initial design, we picked that design and ran with it. Any updates that we did later, functionality-wise, still took that initial design. I don’t know if we gave them the runway to show us that.

At the beginning of the project with them, we had minimal conversations with them about SEO, which is something we’ve gotten into later. If there is anything I would change, I would have had that run more parallel in conversation at the very beginning because there’s been a lot of work we had to backtrack on since we weren’t maximizing from the very beginning.

BACKGROUND

Our company buys and sells designer used clothing, for women and men. We have more than 30 retail locations and started in 1991.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

We needed a new website back in early 2011. We were hoping to find someone to build one on WordPress. 

SOLUTION

Other than the custom Photo Contest plugin and a blog, the only other thing of note would be an integration with Pinterest. HyperArts also developed a custom theme for the site. We didn’t use someone else’s theme.

The project started in April of 2011 and ended in August of 2011.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

We are so very pleased with the website. The pleasure is ongoing. Staff and customers are telling us they love it and more importantly, our stats are up in so many of the categories that matter. Our organic search listing referrals are way up. Visits, pages per visit and average time on site are up. Bounces are down.