Ontarget

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company.

We are a subsidiary of a larger insurance company.

What is your role and responsibilities, please?

I’m the vice president of marketing.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What was your goal for working with Ontarget?

We engaged Ontarget for an online technology partner to help us develop e-commerce and a complex website deployment. We were looking for a company that worked on a WordPress DMS [design management system], and that was smaller company without too much bureaucracy. I like the fact that Ontarget takes an active role in client contacts, and concept through the ideas. They were very flexible in their ability to meet our needs from a technology standpoint.

SOLUTION

Please describe the scope of their work.

They provided design, development, training, and support services. We have done three e-commerce-type websites with them.

What was your process for selecting Ontarget with which to work?

I had a recommendation from someone I’ve worked with in the past that had worked with Terry [Oehrke, president of Ontarget] directly. I had done an RFP [request for proposal] with five different agencies in the area. After interviewing them and talking what their capabilities were, the overall business perspective, I felt very comfortable choosing Ontarget.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

When did you start working with them?

We started working with them in August or September of 2013, and the relationship is still ongoing.

How well do you think Ontarget has performed?

They have performed well. I think they have a few gaps in a few places. Their agency is very small, which may cause a few difficulties. However, they have some development capabilities and they’ve done a good job in that department.

Is there anything unique about them that really makes them stand out, compared to other companies?

I would say Terry certainly knows his stuff. I trust Terry in his decision making. From a development standpoint and approach, he’s been very informative, and takes the technical down to laymen’s terms. He explains what’s going on and what his recommendations are. To me, he really is the focal point of the agency as far as his talent and knowledge.

Looking back on the work so far, is there any area that you think they could improve upon or something that you might do differently?

They need to work on project management on their side and better quality control. A lot of times, things aren’t QC’d when we get them, and we have to QC them ourselves. Additionally, at times when we come back to the project, it feels like that they’ve moved on to something else. We can’t wrap things up as tightly and as quickly as we would like to.

BACKGROUND

Could you provide a brief description of your company?

We're a small-box high consumable retailer.  We sell everyday consumables, national brand, and private label items.

What's your current role and responsibilities within the company?

The senior manager of interactive marketing.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

Could you describe the business challenges you were trying to address before you sought help from Ontarget?

My relationship with them is about five years now. At that time, our company was not doing digital advertising. I knew that I had a conservative budget, big brand name, aspirations, but also kind of realistic expectations in check. 

SOLUTION

Could you describe the scope of work?

I've done a number of things with them. Their core competency and what I continue to use them for is for advertising and CRM [customer relationship management] growth are the big things, CRM growth through advertising. That's the ultimate, main focus I do. That's not just Web-based, but also social, mobile and a few other areas, but it is all digital-based.

They actually ran our email program for a little bit of time. We've done everything from building community websites to doing specialized applications for different special projects and other things. They do work as needed. Again the majority of my investment really goes into the advertising and crowd growth.

Could you describe your process for selecting them as your partner?

It was part of that RFP [request for proposal] process. We selected multiple people and culled down based on that piece. They rose to the top for a few different reasons. One of the things we were looking for was a smaller boutique shop to manage, knowing that we needed to be very conservative and still are very conservative in terms of our budget for this type of activity. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

In terms of results, could you share any statistics, metrics, or user feedback that would demonstrate the effectiveness of the work they've delivered?

We just rolled more than 3 million likes on our Facebook page because of them. We see a lot of growth within our email and other areas when we run the specialty programs.

How well do you think Ontarget has performed overall?

Extremely well based upon the resources that we provided and everything else. Another thing to keep in mind is we're very limited in terms of our people resources here. So we have to work with groups that are able to work somewhat independently on their own. They've excelled in doing that, working within that independent nature. But also, there's a special talent that comes with being able to do that in that there also has to be a good amount of communication to instill that the projects are going, but also to be readily available for any of those questions that I get occasionally from executive level or other areas of our business when they're interested in specific things, target goals, forecast, and other pieces like that.

When working them, is there anything you'd consider unique or special about them that distinguishes them from other vendors you've used?

It's a good group. I've enjoyed working with them. They've always been very fair. When you fall to such a small group, you have the opportunity to know the owner and operator. We've been lucky enough to have relatively stable account management throughout, which is hard to do at that level within a lot of business. There's generally a lot of turn and burn, especially when you talk about having a partner in digital for over five years. That's generally a very strong piece to have, especially when you think about also from an advertising agency perspective, there's a lot of things out there, and a lot of available stuff. They've always been able to accomplish what we needed to and been able to provide how we needed to in a very cost-effective manner.

This group has been adviser/strategist for us. They will come to the table with opportunities.