121eCommerce

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the co-owner of an Equestrian business. We design, manufacture and distribute equestrian products.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire 121eCommerce, and what were your goals?

We have worked with 121 eCommerce for 2 large projects. The first project was a “rescue” where we brought 121 in to help stabilize us after a different development company made significant errors with the deployment of our Magento Commerce site. When it was clear that our newly launched site was unstable and in need of urgent development work, we interviewed a dozen companies and 121 was the clear choice (for reasons described below).

We were thrilled with how quickly they were able to get us stable despite the significant issues they inherited from the previous developer. The second project with 121 was moving our site from Magento Commerce to Magento Open Source. After our experience with them “rescuing” our site, they were the only development company we would trust with that migration.

SOLUTION

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

We interviewed many development companies (all of which were recommended to us by Adobe) before deciding on 121. Everything about 121 was different from the other companies, so it ended up being a very easy decision after we concluded our interviews. When we interviewed other companies, it was painfully clear that they did not understand our urgency to get the site stable, and they all wanted to push us towards an upgrade. No matter how much I stressed the importance of the short term need for stability, they would try to steer the conversation to an upgrade. However, when I met with 121, I spoke with Ben who immediately understood our short term urgency and never tried to impose a different agenda on us. Now that we have worked with 121 for multiple projects, I can attest that this has remained true every step of the way, and one of the many, many reasons why 121 is so different from other development companies. For the second project of moving from Magento Commerce to Magento Open Source, there was never any question that they would earn our business because of their prior stellar work.

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

For the first project where 121 helped us get stable, we needed them to fix numerous bugs and work with 3rd parties. They worked expeditiously, and impressed me at each step with their discipline for maintaining a high standard of quality work. Once a fix was identified, I was eager to deploy, and they would encourage us to wait for proper testing and QA, which we did. Their commitment to doing things properly, continues to impress me. For our second project where we migrated from Magento Commerce to Magento Open Source, I was fortunate to work with the same team (account manager and technical team), so the process was straightforward on my end. 121 ported over our site to Open Source, and worked with 3rd parties on our behalf. One thing I appreciate about 121 is that their communication with 3rd parties is stellar. I asked to be included in all communication so that I could keep an eye on progress and jump in if needed, so I had a lot of transparency into how well they can work with others.

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

This is something that I LOVE about 121. My impression is that you can work with however many (or few) points of contact you prefer. If you only want to speak with your account manager via email, you can. If you want to be very involved and communicate throughout the day rapidly on Slack with multiple members of the team, you can. I prefer the latter. Per my preference, I have regular contact with my account manager (who is organized, communicative, detailed, and a total pleasure to work with) and TL (who routinely impresses me with his creativity, talent, technical prowess and commitment to our business). I have also had the pleasure of getting to know Ben (CEO), Daniel (Director of Client Services), Pablo (CTO) and Paul (Director of Sales). Each and every one of them has stepped up when I have reached out to them directly for support.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

For our business, this is simple to measure. We originally came to 121 with an unstable site as a “rescue”. Fast forward ~2 years, and they have made us stable on an even better platform. Now, we can better focus our time and resources on building new functionality. Our business is better off because 121 is a part of it.

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

My impression is that their project management style is flexible to match how you prefer to work. They made it clear to me from the very beginning that we could communicate on any channel and at any frequency I wanted. I like to work fast and communicate a lot, so we have a very active Slack channel and it works fabulously well for all of us. If I ask for updates, I always get them right away. If I want to get on a call to look into something together, we get on zoom. I prefer not to schedule meetings and just address issues as they arise, and they have met me there.

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

Everything about 121 is different from other development companies I’ve worked with. I absolutely never hear “no” from them. They always look for the “yes” and take responsibility. Development work is notoriously messy, but I gauge success in our partnership by how we work through the inevitable challenges. They are reasonable when things get complicated, and always willing to talk though options. At several points while working together, I have had to make hard business decisions and Ben always makes himself available to brainstorm with me. I also appreciate that they have the ability to make themselves available 24/7 for emergencies. I have peace of mind knowing that if we do encounter an issue in the middle of the night or on a holiday, they are staffed to be able to support us. Everything about 121 makes them a partner of our business and not a vendor.

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

I am enormously grateful for their involvement with our business.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m an outdoor equipment retail company's director of operations and IT.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce?

We were looking to improve our platform to support several of our individual SKUs.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

121eCommerce provided migrated our old platform into Magento and extended some of our features and functionalities. They mainly focused on optimizing the performance of our platform so our customers can check their items out efficiently and see what’s available or not.

Apart from that, they did some maintenance work for further improvements.

What is the team composition?

We primarily worked with Ben (CEO), Daniel (Director of Client Services), Paul (Director of Sales, Marketing, & Data Services), and Brooke (Project Manager)

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce?

121eCommerce was referred to us by their preferred partner, Magento.

How much have you invested with them?

We invested about $150,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from July 2021–July 2022.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve received a lot of great feedback from our customers, citing their seamless experience with the checkout functionality.

The backend is also much smoother now, as we can easily access the platform and database to make edits. Moreover, the product helps us reduce our workload and improve our efficiency, which is one of our biggest requests for this project.

How did 121eCommerce perform from a project management standpoint?

They weren’t performing well from a project management perspective initially, until Daniel took over. Since then, they’ve made the process more cost-efficient, and we’ve been consistently seeing positive results.

We use JIRA and GitHub to manage everything and typically communicate through Slack and RingCentral.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We’re impressed with their product knowledge and willingness to find a solution to every problem and issue.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We experienced some miscommunication regarding the project's scope, so the requirement they delivered didn’t quite meet our expectations. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would advise you to make sure that you scope out your project clearly before engaging in a development project with them.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of an e-commerce company that sells customized wireless routers with integrated service subscription options. We’ve partnered with major VPN providers from around the world, and we’ve been doing business for around 11 years.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

As our products are customized, we have a very customized checkout process, which includes options for advanced configurations and service subscriptions for the clients to choose from. In order to sell the subscriptions, we created an entirely separate landing page during the checkout flow that would redirect the customer before completing the process to have them choose from our subscription options. Our goal was to remove this separate page and integrate that process within the router pages so that users could make all the selections and configurations on a single page before being guided directly to the shopping cart.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We tasked 121eCommerce to redo the checkout flow of our product pages and add a basic Magento integration.

What is the team composition?

We worked with the CEO, Paul (Director of Sales), and various project managers.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent over $32,000, not considering our team's internal cost and work hours invested.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in April 2021, and we attempted to launch in February 2022, but the product didn’t work. We haven’t launched yet, and we’re now considering our options.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

How did your relationship with the vendor evolve?

Initially, 121eCommerce’s CEO reached out to us, and we had great conversations about our challenge. He gave us great ideas, as well as a long speech about how his company was focused on improving their clients’ ROI.

During these discussions, we made them clear that we had a $10,000–$15,000 budget to redo our checkout process, but we agreed to pay them for their services on the go. We also made them very clear, over and over again, that we need to launch on November 1st, 2021.

After talking to the CEO and starting the project, we were connected with Paul. He had the full breakdown of what we needed and talked about how we could use Magento to improve our checkout flow without adding new modules. His promises were wonderful, and we felt great having conversations with him.

The project manager was able to follow along with that initial process, and within two months, 121eCommerce had a full mockup of what we wanted to see on mobile and desktop devices. However, this project manager suddenly left the project, and we were assigned a new one who didn’t know anything about the project.

Once again, we had the initial conversation with Paul and the new project manager to bring them up to speed. Within 1–2 months, this project manager also dropped out of the project, and we had to bring a new project manager up to speed again. Suddenly, we were onboarding one project manager after another.

The first project manager change didn’t cost us anything, but we were charged an hourly rate for project management after that. Thus, we ended up spending about $6,000 on project management without those people doing anything but passing information from one to the other.

121eCommerce delivered the mockups around May 2021, and we were promised that we would launch before Black Friday and Cyber Monday of that year. However, September came, and we had nothing. I spoke with the CEO to see what was going on and why the project hadn’t been completed. He apologized and told us that they had development shortages and overbooked projects.

However, they promised to launch in the first week of November but told us that they might need a couple of extra weeks in the worst-case scenario. Additionally, we received an email from the CEO offering a 10% discount on their services until project completion.

We never heard back from 121eCommerce’s CEO after that, and to this day, we haven’t launched yet. A couple of weeks ago, after realizing that they wouldn’t be able to deliver the functionalities they promised, we decided to launch what we had.

When we attempted to launch, the checkout process wasn’t creating any subscriptions in the backend, which was the main feature we needed. Then, I tried to reengage them and tell them that the subscription flow had been done incorrectly, to which the project manager answered via email that they weren’t aware of any subscription model. At that point, we cut off communication with them and contacted Clutch to leave a review.

How did 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner address the challenges that arose?

When we started working together, we agreed on one very specific concession: they had to complete the development work within 35 work hours. 121eCommerce promised to cap the project to that amount of time. However, by February 2022, we were charged 30.9 extra hours at $150 per hour, which meant a budget overage of about $4,500.

After our launch attempt, I kept emailing 121eCommerce to find a solution, but they told us that, to their understanding, the project was completed. I told them that the product didn’t work and that we also needed to address the budget overages.

When we realized that they wouldn’t complete the project, we just asked them for a refund. However, they just offered to refund $2,000. We negotiated to get at least a $3,000 refund, but they wanted us to sign a non-disparagement agreement so that we couldn’t talk anywhere about the project. Our condition was that we would be able to go to them to fix any issue, but when I noticed that the project manager didn’t even know what we were talking about, I told them that we wouldn’t sign the agreement. For us, it was more important to let people know their quality than to get $3,000.

Describe the impact this engagement has had on your business.

Obviously, we couldn’t launch by Black Friday and Cyber Monday, which are always the most important days for our business to sell products and subscriptions. Since we didn’t launch, we also delayed product launches for five months. Thus, we decided to pivot and launch our new products last month in the old checkout system.

Overall, 121eCommerce’s involvement has completely stalled our business and taken away many of the work hours that our developer could have spent on other projects. Currently, we’re deciding whether to take legal action against 121eCommerce for damages, breach of contract, and not receiving a working product.

Is there anything that the vendor did well or that you would consider a strength?

Not really. 121eCommerce added a good feature where they made the add-to-cart button a sticky so that it stays on the page when visitors scroll through it. However, that feature only works properly on certain pages, and we now have to spend time fixing it on the rest of the pages.

Additionally, Paul is the most talented resource they have. He did a great job initially, and I have nothing but good things to say about him.

In what specific areas can they improve?

Having a single project manager assigned to our project could have made all the difference. Bouncing between five different project managers created a wall of mismanagement, miscommunication, and misinformation that, to this day, we can’t get past.

Additionally, 121eCommerce needs to provide clarity in communication and be aware of the deadlines. Overall, they need to improve their basic development management skills.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

If you’re going to work with 121eCommerce, have them sign a contract that specifies that they’ll assign a single project manager and that they’ll limit the work hours to your agreement. If they can’t keep a single project manager for some reason, ask them not to charge you for the changes and promise that they will enter the project completely up to speed.

Company Responses

The vendor responded on March 21, 2022.

“Wireless Routers” has some points that are definitely accurate, which is why we offered them a significant make-goods credit. We did switch project managers on them….but that’s also where the accuracy of this review ends. In the course of time people in projects get switched, and it’s never been an issue with other clients. We’ve been in business for 8 years, this is hardly the first time we’ve had to make a Project Manager adjustment.

When we first switched their project manager, as they said, we gave a credit. It may have been a case of too little too late on our part, but even from the beginning of the relationship almost all requests or directives were always one or two words emails or slacks where the context was unclear; any questions on our end for clarification were met with silence or pushback. Ironically, the client became more frustrated and difficult after we addressed their concerns by changing the Project Manager and issuing a make goods credit.

On our end we should have realized earlier on that the Project Manager was not the right fit for how this client communicated. It is likely that had we made a change earlier on, we could have salvaged this relationship and delivered a win. We have since put in checks to ensure that a situation like this does not occur again.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the digital marketing director for Gallagher Promotional Products, a company that primarily supplies dealerships with advertising collateral such as flags, signages, and banners.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

We needed someone to provide us with Magento e-commerce development.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

121eCommerce helped migrate our previous Magento site to Magento 2, as well as import all our data and improve its functionalities.

Moreover, they’re currently providing us with ongoing maintenance and support to implement upgrades and bug fixes to the platform.

What is the team composition?

My main point of contact is their client advocate, and they’re in charge of delegating tasks and communicating my needs to their team.

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

We came across 121eCommerce through an email ad. We were in the process of upgrading our Magento platform so I got in touch with them because of their professional and enticing offer.

How much have you invested with them?

So far, we’ve invested around $80,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing engagement started in November 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We have some SEO setbacks and we’re working to recover our search position, so we don’t have any immediate metrics we can share at the moment. In terms of general features, I can say that the new website performs better than the old one.

How did 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner perform from a project management standpoint?

The setbacks we’ve experienced were to be expected and as far as timing goes, it’s quite difficult to get a hold of them sometimes as their team is spread out in different offices around the world.

Nevertheless, they’re still able to address everything I need within the timeframe we set.

What did you find most impressive about them?

We thought their initial onboarding process was very professional and well put together.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It would’ve been nice if they could've adhered to the budget better, but that’s not entirely on them and that’s expected for this type of project.

In addition, the communication could’ve been better as there were some instances where our requests for the team weren’t being translated properly by the client advocate.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Before engaging in a partnership with 121eCommerce, I would advise talking to someone who has had experience with Magento migration to get a better understanding of the whole process.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the Marketing Manager at a company that manufactures and distributes concrete forming and testing accessories.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner, and what were your goals?

Our website had become incredibly outdated. We hired this team to help rescue the development of our new Magento site. We were drawn to hire 121 based on their knowledge of Magento and their willingness to educate and teach us along the way being new to the Magento world.

Our goal was to bring our website up to date and auto-responsive, making it easy for customers to navigate and increase our traffic/online orders.

SOLUTION

How did you select 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner and what were the deciding factors?

We searched online via google for companies that focused on Magento website rescue missions. After a few introductory phone calls with 121, we knew it would be a great business relationship. They were knowledgable about Magento, very familiar with website rescue projects, and able to understand the uniqueness of our company.

They were very informative, communicative, transparent, and willing to teach us along the way. We also liked that this business relationship had the potential to be long term due to their easy pay as you go format. We would be able to seamlessly continue working together post launch on website maintenance related items which we saw as a huge benefit to us as we do not have in-house developers/IT.

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

We had weekly meetings to discuss timeline of project, open tickets, and items that still need to be completed. They made recommendations on what extensions to purchase that would help solve certain problems we came across during our testing phase.

How many people from the 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner team worked with you, and what were their positions?

We had one main person of contact. However, you can tell they worked great as a team as I also spoke to a few others in regards to certain tasks they specialized in. There was also a team of developers.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our site just launched a week ago, and already online sales have significantly increased. Clients love the updated design and that it is auto-responsive. The entire site is incredibly user friendly and our product information is very clear to the consumer.

We are incredibly happy with how the new site turned out and are looking forward to the site growing with Magento and the help of 121.

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

I had weekly meetings with my main point of contact at 121 who then communicated with the rest of his team, created tickets, and followed up on tickets. 121 was always readily available when we had a question or concern or asked for an update.

We communicated via phone, email, slack, screen sharing, and Jira.

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

121 helped us bring our website up to present day standards. We had never worked with Magento before, and We truly appreciate them not only doing the work quickly and correctly but also taking the extra time. They educate us on all possible options/solutions/extensions along the way.

They would send us links so we could learn the steps on how to make future changes/updates our selves. Once they found out I was a visual learner, they began to film short how to videos to send over!

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

We are so glad we found 121 and hired them to wrap up the work on our Magento site and launch our new site. I would highly recommend hiring 121 to help with your Magento site!

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the marketing manager of Ohio Power Tool, and we sell professional-grade tools and equipment.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce?

We recently decided to upgrade our e-commerce site, so we needed someone to provide us with Magento web development.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

121eCommerce provided us with Magento web development services. We’re currently in the maintenance phase of the partnership, so they’re helping us identify issues on an hourly basis.

What is the team composition?

My main points of contact are Akiva (Client Advocate) and Daniel (CEO).

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce?

I was looking for local Magento development companies on Google and came across 121eCommerce. We had a great initial conversation and it made me feel like a part of their team.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing partnership started in December 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

One of the biggest issues we had with the old site is that it would crash whenever it experienced a high volume of traffic. 121eCommmerce was able to provide our website with a great structure, which resulted in our ongoing success — we recently ran a Cyber Week promotion, and it’s the most successful sale we’ve ever had.

We’ve had our ups and downs, but I’m still happy with our decision to work with them because they keep me involved as much as possible and provide me with technical knowledge, so I can start using them less and less.

It has gotten to a point where I’m more comfortable coming up with my own solutions, instead of paying them to solve my problems.

How did 121eCommerce perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management blows my mind because of how accurate it is. We use Slack and a ticketing system called JIRA as a means of communication with the developers, and see the progress of the project.

Moreover, they’re very strict about scheduling and timelines, and they’re always available for video calls whenever we have any concerns.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their strongest points are their communication and level of understanding. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

One thing they could improve on is the turnaround time for their tasks.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would suggest taking the time to figure out what you really want when talking to them, because they’re very good at quoting what needs to be done.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the e-commerce and digital services manager for Norscot Group, Inc. We’re a promotional goods company for four major national brands, and I’m responsible for anything that faces customers.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

We were migrating our old e-commerce platform to Magento. It was a pretty challenging project because it needed to be made up with our NetSuite ERP system. Also, we might have specific customer rules, pricing breakpoints, shipping, and promotions for one account, but that can be different on almost every account, and the way they have to interface with our ERP also varies.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

At this point, we’ve done ten sites with 121eCommerce, but we initially contracted them for seven. As time went on, we’ve included a few other accounts.

Initially, we gave them the requirements for the e-commerce site. They talked to our CEO and CFO and had to learn the ins and outs of our business. Then, 121eCommerce created the templates for sites and some of the UI. We provided all of the item descriptions and design, and we worked with a third party to build the connector between the ERP system and Magento.

What is the team composition?

Up until recently, Aaron (Director of Client Services) was our primary point of contact. He’s earned a well-deserved promotion, so we’re now working with Samantha (Client Advocate) and their development team. Damián (Magento 2 Technical Leader) is their lead developer. He’s very knowledgeable and great to work with.

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

I was brought on about a week after they signed the contract, but our president and CEO heard good things about Magento. Then, he went through PeerNet, which is a consortium of promotional product companies. He was told to look for 121eCommerce.

How much have you invested with them?

At this point, it’s over $150,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We signed the contract in February 2020, and we’re still working with them. The crazy days are past us, but we’re launching new sites and developing new features.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our web revenue is up significantly against 2019 on a whole business basis, but we also see better numbers with each account.

On the other hand, we’ve been taking in more phone orders. The website is functioning as an online catalog, particularly for some of our larger customers. They just check out the site and call in to put an invoice for $10,000 purchases, and we attribute it to the clarity and transparency of the new site.

How did 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner perform from a project management standpoint?

It certainly has been the most challenging project I’ve been on. We have four different teams working on it across the globe, which has pushed everyone to the limit. Nonetheless, 121eCommerce has performed quite well.

At first, we had a couple of communication issues because they assumed I had access to their Jira ticketing system, which they later gave us. We also struggled to find the right communication method to work remotely. Ultimately, we decided to use Slack for anything immediate, email for anything official, and the ticketing system to track errors and logs. Now, we’re satisfied with how the communication is going.

Overall, they’ve done a great job at keeping things on track. We’ve been with them for 18 months now, and they’ve been great at addressing hiccups and problems. We’ve relied on their expertise to understand the timing and different aspects of our project. 121eCommerce is quick to own up to issues, and their approach has always been to make this a long-term partnership.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They have a tight relationship with the Magento home office, so they have access that we have no way to earn. If a problem comes up on the side, they can get an answer in hours.

Additionally, their development team has worked wonders and accommodated some of our oddball requests, which is a huge asset to our business.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There have been some times when things needed more live testing, but they were assumed ready. It took us a while to recover from that, and it could’ve been avoided, but they’ve owned up to it.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

In the beginning, we didn’t know we were getting into such a complex project. 121eCommerce had to scope it a few times, which led to some clashes with our senior management team. We would’ve benefited from an initial deep dive to our different teams; it would’ve saved a lot of heartache in the mid-stages.

Therefore, you should make sure to provide insight into the scope from people outside your management team. 121eCommerce can only operate with what they’re given, so be clear on the scope.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am a special projects manager at a party and events rental company. We provide everything needed for an event, such as tables, chairs, linens, cooking equipment, and dance floors. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am a special projects manager at a party and events rental company. We provide everything needed for an event, such as tables, chairs, linens, cooking equipment, and dance floors. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

121eCommerce has been our go-to tech support provider. We turn to them for help whenever we have IT concerns. They worked directly with our team and helped us realize what we wanted our websites to look like, including their visuals and interface. We used Magento for the project. 

Additionally, 121eCommerce was an integral part of our design phase. We had a brainstorming session with our marketing team, but they brought our design to life and fleshed out our ideas with actual functionalities. They gave good ideas since they were experts at Magento. 

We provided 121eCommerce with wireframes and mockups from our brainstorming sessions. We also showed them our old website and what we didn’t like about it. From there, we came up with ideas on how to make the new sites better.

They researched some extensions that they added to our site. They presented us with options whenever we wanted something not available on the default theme. For example, they added the Amasty extension to get our order check-out cart exactly the way we wanted. They also used custom forms so people can request an online contact or appointment. 

We launched the websites in May 2021. 121eCommerce’s team is still helping us with post-launch work and minor tweaks. 

What is the team composition?

My main contact is Akiva (Client Advocate), and I message him almost every day for the project. He is very helpful, resourceful, and easy to communicate with. We would jump on Zoom calls to brainstorm and give ideas and directions to the developers. 

I have also worked with Shmuli (Client Advocate), Daniel (Director of Client Services), and Alejandro (Senior Web Application Developer). I haven’t had interaction with their development team since Akiva manages them. 

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

Our management team chose 121eCommerce through recommendation and research. 

What is the status of this engagement?

I joined the project in January 2020, and 121eCommerce was then already providing services to our company. Our engagement is ongoing, and we have plans to do more things and improve the website in the future. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

In only two weeks, we already have 400 accounts created, and daily we see 20–40 new accounts from our website. 121eCommerce provides high-quality work and detail-oriented feedback. They log all of our conversations and data request — everything is organized. 

Our management is very pleased with 121eCommerce as we finished the project ahead of schedule and under budget. Additionally, they had been patient with us during the difficult business cycle of the COVID-19 pandemic. They are a true hands-on partner who wants us to succeed. Our management already recommended them to other people in our industry.  

How did 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner perform from a project management standpoint?

121eCommerce is excellent at project management. I’m a project manager myself, and I appreciate their Excel data charts and timeframe logs. They even gave me access to their Jira board which allows me to see specific requests and their history, status, progress, and direction — that elevated our communication.

We met using Zoom and RingCentral, but we mostly email back and forth our ideas and concerns. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

121eCommerce’s responsiveness and attention to detail are top of the line. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s tough to consider since the COVID-19 pandemic is ongoing, and the events industry is severely affected. The project would have finished quicker if COVID-19 didn’t slow us down and consumed our time putting out fires. However, that wasn’t 121eCommerce’s fault. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Akiva is wonderful — just ask for him as your project manager since he is helpful, considerate, and patient. We appreciated him very much since we don’t know anything about coding. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a marketing manager for a company that manufactures and sells dietary supplements. We sell our products exclusively online.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce – Magento Certified Partner?

We decided to redo our site completely, and we went to them for that task.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

121eCommerce designed and developed our new site from scratch on Magento. It’s a basic online store. Customers use it to learn about our products and buy them. They also provide maintenance services when needed.

What is the team composition?

I’ve worked with several of them already. I have a main point of contact that I can message on Slack if I need something changed on the site.

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce – Magento Certified Partner?

They were recommended to me by someone who’d worked with them in the past. I gave it a try, and it turned out well.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them around February 2018, and they’re still our partner for web support.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’re enjoying working with 121eCommerce. Our previous site experience wasn’t impressive. It was challenging for customers to use it, and some buttons didn’t even work.

Everything’s working now, and our partnership’s going well. We’ve achieved every single goal from before, and we have new ones to tackle.

There’s always room to refine and grow, but even simple website features weren’t working well before, or they didn’t work at all. Their team fixed everything on time and within budget.

How did 121eCommerce – Magento Certified Partner perform from a project management standpoint?

I have no complaints. We mainly use Slack for communication, along with email and Zoom calls. They always get back to me quickly when I ask for something.

What did you find most impressive about them?

From what I can remember, 121eCommerce delivers faster than our previous provider, and there are no surprises.

They have a fixed hourly rate, and they tell us in advance how many hours they’ll need for a task. Things are clearer and more transparent now. We can decide whether or not to implement something based on their estimates, and we can postpone features until the next month when we have the budget for them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I think they’re good.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would recommend them to anyone looking for a web developer.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of web development for Vintage Tub & Bath. We’re a firm located in northeastern Pennsylvania and we do e-commerce in the realm of home improvement where we sell vintage bathtubs, vanities, mirrors, and pretty much everything related to bathrooms or different areas of the kitchen throughout your house. I’m a ‘developer’ slash ‘coder’ by trade and moved into the directorial position here about a year ago. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

We had our online store running on Magento 1 and our initiative this year was to migrate our current store and website data over to Magento 2 and then launch that. 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner was the vendor who helped us in our endeavor. They assisted us in developing the site and migrating everything. The team also configured Magento 2 to prep for our new site launch.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Their scope of work was robust. We went ahead and designed the new site in-house using designers and other similar things. Then, we asked them to bring that to life within the Magento store. They were responsible for selling everything from the custom templates that we used for our site to all of the features of our platform. The features included the different logins, checkout procedures, feature plugins with third-parties we have for review, and anything that went into making our new site. 

They also had a hand in developing from scratch and assisting our in-house team with connecting some dots. Their main responsibility was migrating our old store and all of the data onto our new platform. At the same time, they also made sure that those processes connected to the endpoints within our stores including data feed, pricing, order values, reviews, and more. 

We have an ongoing relationship with them for the post-launch of our new site. They help us with issues that arise and things that are expected to happen with the migration of this caliber. 

What is the team composition?

Daniel (Director of Client Services) is our project manager and our overseer. He makes sure that the project moves along. Our day-to-day project manager is Diego (Technical Client Advocate). They also have a lead developer and there are two other developers working with him. In total, we work with a total of 4–5 people.

How did you come to work with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner?

When we identified we needed to move our store from Magento 1, we did our due diligence and went through the different partners for Magento upgrade. Magento has a few preferred partners and there were companies out there that publicized that they could help us get through the transition process. We interviewed around five different companies and we decided to go with 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner for a number of reasons.

First, we chose them because their price point was competitive. They weren’t the cheapest, but they weren’t the most expensive either. We also talked to some of their past clientele and vetted them through those channels. In the end, everybody had good reviews about them and said they worked well with the team. Next, we noticed that during the initial stages, they were responsive and got back to us quickly. They also made sure that our requests were taken care of. In the end, their price point, as well as how they presented themselves convinced us to partner with them. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $160,000–$200,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement started in April 2020, and it’s ongoing. The first part of the project ended in December 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Since we just launched a week and a half ago now, we haven’t had a lot of user feedback. From the user feedback that we’ve gained so far, we’ve received glowing reviews about the site. In terms of site speed and functionality, we've seen great improvements from its previous state last year. Overall, our UX functionality and general customer experience have also been enhanced.

As we continue to have more people touch the site, we’ll get more feedback and be able to give a more concise answer about their impact. However, for the short-term results, we’ve had great feedback and we have certainly noticed an uptick in visitors and sales — we’re doing pretty well. 

How did 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management and communications have been great. They are always in touch daily with us. We use Slack to communicate on most days. We also have weekly meetings that we can meet for about an hour and go over issues from the week and things that we have on deck. We also talk about the goals we want to scratch off the list so that we do not have to do it the week after.

Diego is our main point of contact, and he has always been excellent. He always keeps us abreast of where they stand on their development process and if we can help them with anything they need. He’s always in contact with us and organized, and just prepared from that angle.  

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their combined communication skills, professionalism, and quality of work have impressed us. It seems we have complicated processes — we have to order tracking and other different systems we use without the site, and it tends to get very grainy and complex. As a result, just being able to keep tabs of that, digest that, and be able to output a product that’s right in line with what we need — that’s probably the most impressive.  They do a good job of summarizing a complicated project and doing a great job at executing it. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I’m sure there’s a couple of things that we could’ve noticed beforehand just in terms of the scope of work. Sometimes what’s quoted and what we need to do in the project can expand a little bit  — and it gets granular. Perhaps, a more comprehensive look at some of the systems that we had before starting, and understanding the tech stack that’s involved in each one can help diagnose potential problems would've been an improvement. However, those things are unavoidable. Essentially, as troubles have come up and issues arose, they’ve been equipped to handle them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would recommend 121eCommerce - Magento Certified Partner to anybody else considering a migration or any kind of Magento work. Just have clear communication to keep in touch with the folks there. As I said, we’ve used Slack and we have weekly meetings. Additionally, ask for a specific timeframe and bandwidth on their end. Sometimes, some of their developers and project managers are stationed throughout the world so the timing doesn’t always work out. As result, you can be sure that once you engage with them, you’re able to meet at the time that they’re available. 

There are certainly other providers out there that are less expensive, but when you compare it with what you’re getting for that money and the quality of their work — I think the choice will be simple.