Aktiv Studios

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a commercial real estate company and I’m the firm's administrative assistant. 

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Studios?

They created a website that can show some of the company’s listings for various regions, both the local and the regional investments. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

They created a website for us using Craft CMS. The team also created the layout and website design. Moreover, they trained me to do what I do, which is maintaining and updating as needed including adding and removing information, uploading photos, and so on. 

What is the team composition?

We worked with two people from Aktiv Studios. 

How did you come to work with Aktiv Studios?

Aktiv Studios actually met with my boss. Once they got in touch with him, they came up with the idea of working together to develop a website.

How much have you invested with them?

For this site, we spent close to $10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We partnered with Aktiv Studios from June 2018–January 2019.

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

We were very pleased with their work. We were also amazed by their assistance, training, and level of follow-up. 

How did Aktiv Studios perform from a project management standpoint?

To facilitate project management, the Aktiv Studios team utilized email and phone conferences. When it was my time to step in for the training, we also communicated in the same way.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I just think they were excellent across the board. Their knowledge, willingness to learn, patience, and creativity impressed us. We think they were a great company.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can’t think of anything that Aktiv Studios could improve on.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They would be great with web design and development. As a matter of fact, we’re working on a second site with them.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CEO of a physical therapy company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Studios?

We had an older website that needed to be modernized.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They rebuilt our site from scratch because the old one was completely outdated. We updated our picture, content, and SEO strategy to make our site more functional for users and Google. The site is now live, but we intend to work with them on additional phases in the future.  

What is the team composition?

I worked with two people from their team.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Studios?

We found them through a co-worker. I was impressed with their previous work and clients that they had advertised on their website.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent about $10,000 on their work. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started the project in January 2020, and our teams are still working together.

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

They were able to take my vision and content to create a dynamic website. While the site just launched last week, we’re already noticing improved SEO rankings on Google. Additionally, we’ve received positive comments about the look of the new site from our former clients.   

How did Aktiv Studios perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve performed excellently. Not only did we receive the expected results through their team, they often exceeded our expectations as well. We used ActiveCollab for communication, and they were always readily available to us. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were great communicators and were able to discover our vision and make it a reality. I had ideas and concepts for the website, and they made it happen. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’s been a smooth collaboration. Any issues that come up can be fine-tuned as we work together.  

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I recommend them to anyone looking to build a cutting-edge, dynamic platform to set you apart in the marketplace. It’s important to have your vision planned out, but they can take it from there.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the senior director of marketing of The Battery Atlanta™, a 365-day sports and entertainment experience with events, shopping, and dining.

For what projects/services did your company hire Aktiv Studios?

We needed help to build a compelling, fresh, responsive website that offered us flexibility and future growth.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to give guests an easy-to-navigate experience that provides them all the information they need to see what events are here, as well as directions and how to park.

How did you select this vendor?

We searched for quite a while for a local company in Cobb County. Aktiv Studios has great reviews and experience creating sites that had the type of interactivity we needed. 

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

Aktiv Studios custom built a WordPress site that includes all the items on our wish list. They created a site that’s user-friendly not only on the backend for administrators but also easy to navigate for our consumers. We can modify parking messages as needed. Users can search for events using multiple filters and tags.

What was the team composition?

We work directly with Gary (founder, Aktiv Studios) and Darrell (CTO, Aktiv Studios).

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

We could not be happier with our decision to use Aktiv Studios. It's like night and day. Our new website works exactly as it's supposed to. The layout and designs are beautiful. The event portal works wonderfully, and we've closed multiple deals now that customers and clients can actually contact us through our website.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

The project was arranged and managed very effectively. They use a tracking system that we had access to at any time. They were extremely responsive to all of our questions and requests, always making sure we were in the loop on the project.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their customer service is amazing. They really take the time to listen to what we want and why we need things to work a certain way. 

Are there any areas for improvement?

No, there's nothing that comes to mind.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO and founder of a media and communications company.

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Studios?

We were designing a website for one of our clients and needed a vendor who could develop it for us.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aktiv Studios developed a WordPress site for our client. They also developed our WordPress site for us, which took about four months.

We went through a multi-step process. For our initial kickoff, they did their own research beforehand and came with ideas to share about the look and feel for the site. They developed wireframes and built from those pending our approval. They focused on the design while we wrote the copy. They developed the site map and made recommendations as to the best template to support the material.

What is the team composition?

We worked primarily with the two founders.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Studios?

We'd been looking for a web partner for a while that we could refer services to. We'd found Aktiv at least a year beforehand and were looking for the right project to work with them on. We’d tried working together on several projects, but those never came to fruition.

Trust was important to us as we'd had a lot of bad experiences. We wanted highly skilled support and didn't want to be assigned more junior people. They’re a very small team. They put the company founders on our projects, and they know what they're talking about.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested about $40,000 with them between the two projects.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from early 2018 to early 2019.

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

We’ve had nothing but positive comments on our site. We have lead forensics incorporated into our site and can see that we’re getting what we want. We get lots of hits per day from prospective clients including from large brands. Lots of people fill out the inquiry form on our site. They’re spending time on critical pages. We recently won a high-value project that reflects all of this.

How did Aktiv Studios perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re very communicative. They have a messaging system in a project management platform that facilitated consistent back-and-forth. We spoke several times a week. They never waited more than a day to get back to us. The responsiveness was particularly reassuring as we were the middleman working with the client.

We used their platform that provides real-time updates. It tracked the design, copy, and wireframes. That ensured lots of transparency throughout the process. We could see what would be built before it was completed and make changes as necessary. We had extensive exchanges about the copy—as well as changed and expanded the scope of work multiple times—and they were very accommodating. The process was efficient, seamless, and ensured transparency.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They leveraged the right technology to provide transparency and peace of mind. They’ve invested resources in building their portal and tools like website heat maps. Many websites can be behemoth projects to work on. There is often little clarity about what coders do. I’m not sure if they’ve developed their own software platform or just branded it but it its incredibly helpful. The heat maps allow us to see where the sites get traction, which pages work well, and which should be changed. It all supports an ongoing relationship for them to not just maintain the site but make strategic recommendations and improvements.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I think they did a very good job.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Any client needs to know that it's a partnership. It's a two-way interaction, and you get back as good as what you give. I think a lot of brands forget that. Aktiv needs to understand the bigger picture of the website and how to build it as an effective asset for the client. Treating them as a partner is very important.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m a regional director of plan review with IHG. We’re a global hotel company with over nine hotel brands. I develop and manage processes for new construction and hotel renovation reviews.

For what projects/services did your company hire Aktiv Studios?

We needed to improve a form to help us and our franchise owners accurately identify and review the movable furniture, fixtures, and equipment (FF&E) in our hotels.

What were your goals for this project?

The forms already existed, but we wanted them to be more professional and easier to update.

How did you select this vendor?

A coworker referred us to them.

Describe the project in detail.

They provided an interactive form that displays required information in an organized manner, expediting the review process. This information includes the item, manufacturer, design/color, and a fill-in-the-blank comment field for different areas of the hotel. People update the information in an Excel spreadsheet, which is then applied to an InDesign file.

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

The forms have been successful both for us internally and our franchise owners. Our review process is much more efficient.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Meetings were easy to schedule, and transferring information between teams was seamless. They implemented all our changes swiftly.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their software knowledge and time estimation were outstanding.

Are there any areas for improvement?

No, not that I saw. We’re satisfied with their results and will continue to use Aktiv for other interactive forms.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am Web Communications Manager for my company.

What business challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Web Solutions?

We were rebranding our company and wanted a new intranet to fit our new brand; our look and feel. The intranet was mainly a portal for employees to come in and get news information for the company, but also where they could get pertinent information that they needed for everyday use for the company.

There were several key features that we were looking for in the redesign. We wanted our stock information and social media accounts to feed into the site. In addition, we wanted a news feature where we could schedule and post news articles and employees could have the ability to comment on the stories that we post on there. 

Please describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail.

First, we did a discovery period where we decided on the site map for the site. From there, we worked on the design of the site. We built out the site map, but then they built out a skeleton of the site design for us. 

The key features that they helped us with included a user functionality feature where we can create new users. We have the whole “forgot your password” feature with notification emails. We have a library that they built out for us, it’s a database kind of function. Once we finished with that, we started doing content creation and then we went into the development of the site where they plugged everything in for us. Then we did a test of the site and we launched.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Web Solutions?

I wasn’t a part of the selection group. I came in after they were selected. 

Could you provide a sense of the size of this initiative in financial terms?

All development was about $100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them September 2015 until sometime in May 2016.

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

We’ve had a lot of positive responses from our employees. They enjoy going on the site and reading the stories and being able to navigate easily to the information that they need to find. We have a lot of employees interacting and commenting on stories, which didn’t happen before.

How did Aktiv Web Solutions perform from a project management standpoint?

They did a good job. If I ever had any issues, I brought it up with Chris [Aktiv Web Solutions] and he worked with his team to get it resolved. We mainly corresponded through phone and email, but they also had a Collab site that we worked with. That’s where we would upload documents and things, we needed to share with them so that it was all in one place.

We mainly worked with three people, but then we had a couple of other people that came in and supported us. We talked with Chris and the Project Manager, they mainly headed up the projects. If there was a developer that was working onsite, we would correspond with them as well. The team stayed consistent. When we were developing, I spoke with them on a daily basis to a few times a week. We definitely spoke with them every single week.

What distinguishes Aktiv Web Solutions from other providers?

Their response rate is impressive. They get back to you pretty fast when you need something.

Do you have any recommendations for others considering working with Aktiv Web Solutions?

They’re a good group to work with. They care about your site and getting it done right. If you’re looking for somebody who’s responsive, then they’re the ones to go to.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am a Digital Marketing Specialist for a company in the Bay Area, California.

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Web Solutions?

We were originally only looking for help on the backside of our website—development only. But Aktiv had also been there for us on tech and marketing projects. They became our “go-to” for any questions having to do with search, Google Analytics, server, CMS, etc.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aktiv helped us with a number of things. When we first hired on Aktiv, our website did not render correctly on mobile and we needed to update to HTML5. Aktiv updated our website so that it rendered correctly on mobile.

We had an outdated main navigation and wanted viewers to be able to find links more easily. Aktiv suggested optimizing our main menu with images. They supplied images and created a beautifully tailored mega menu. In addition, our servers were running out of space, and the website was in danger of going down. Aktiv was our consultant. They brought up questions for us to consider before migrating to new servers, while also coming up with creative ideas and recommendations.

Also, we were manually downloading form responses and uploading them to Salesforce, which was very time consuming. Aktiv set up automated Salesforce forms (web-to-lead) so that data from forms streamed directly into Salesforce without us having to touch them.

Lastly, we had a few emergencies, and pulled Aktiv in as a consultant, trouble shooter, or to implement quickly. They are always on their toes—very responsive.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Web Solutions?

We have had other suppliers in the past, and we looked at 16 other possibilities, but we’ve been working with Aktiv for the last 4 years now—they have been a very helpful partner and they work well with all of our departments. The process for selecting was based on their past clients, previous experience, personality fit, and reasonable cost.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them in April 2014.

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

65% of our traffic is mobile. We wouldn’t have that visibility if Aktiv did not migrate us to responsive and HTML5. And, the forms on our website are web-to-lead. If Aktiv did not develop these forms for us, we would be at risk of losing the data, would’ve spent hours manipulating forms to filter for email addresses for campaigns, and waiting on other departments to upload the lists to Salesforce for us.

The mega menu was positively received. Other projects they worked on behind the scenes, like helping IT to implement SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) and migrate to new servers, unfortunately go unnoticed, but without them, our website could have crashed.

How did Aktiv Web Solutions perform from a project management standpoint?

Their online project manager helps to keep all of our tasks organized, and they are very responsive. We mostly communicate by email and through the online project manager, but we do have calls. We’re in touch about 2-3 times a week or more, if there’s something urgent. Gary and Chris [partners] are my main points of contact with Aktiv.

What did you find most impressive about Aktiv Web Solutions?

Their communication on calls. Gary and Chris are very personable, but also know their stuff. They make the techy details easier for us to understand and seem to always have a recommendation on whatever project or question we bring to them—whether it’s marketing, tech, reporting, search engines, etc. They work well with all of our teams.

Are there any areas Aktiv Web Solutions could improve?

They’re pretty helpful. I’m not sure.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Aktiv Web Solutions?

They’re excellent with any responsive design, custom development, CMS integration, or digital marketing project you might have. All you need to do is tell them your business goals and what you are trying to accomplish on the web, along with any restrictions, and they’ll work hard to find the most efficient long-term solution for you. They won’t cut corners, but that’s not what you want in the long run anyways.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the IT director of a realtor company in Augusta, Georgia. We are kind of the market leader in our area, and we serve the markets of Augusta, Aiken, Columbia County, and Richmond County. At any given time, we maintain 30% or more of the market share in sales and leasings.

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Web Solutions?

We hired Aktiv to salvage an incomplete project website. We had hired another group, and the project had dragged on well past all the deadlines that they originally gave us. Aktiv came in and knocked the project out of the park for us.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We were coming out of a tailspin when we hired Aktiv, because we had been working with another group on a web development project that didn't quite go as planned. We were looking for somebody to take what we had been working on and make a much better end product than I think we could have come up with otherwise. Aktiv was able to maintain most of the code the other company built. The core of the site remained, but Aktiv gave us a nice new frontend for it and cleaned up some things that hadn’t worked well on the backend. Our agent directory was one of the things they cleaned up for us, and that turned out really well. Of course, the search is the core of our site. The display for it was pretty awful before, but we’re really happy with the way that turned out. They also worked on optimizing the database of agents and properties, which provides the search results.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Web Solutions?

I vetted quite a few companies, and when I spoke to Chris at Aktiv, he seemed to understand exactly what we were going through and he had the right answers to my questions. Their team was small, which was kind of a strong point for me. The company we had worked with before was large, and we got handed a lot around their internal teams. With Aktiv, I liked that I was able to talk directly to the people who were going to be working on the project. Only 3 people worked on it, but I was impressed with the amount of work they were able to crank out. I think they recognized what they were able to take on and what they couldn't, but they took on our project and probably turned away some others in the meantime.

How much have you invested with Aktiv Web Solutions?

I don't remember exactly how much we spent off the top of my head. I think we came in a little bit over $100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

It took about 6 months to go through everything with Aktiv — get the project scoped out, get a statement of work, and then kick it off once it was approved. They saw it through and stayed on track the whole time. I don't think we had any issues with timeliness. They hit all the checkpoints. The project has concluded, for the most part. We occasionally engage them for some basic maintenance and upkeep, and they’re still responsive and I continue to have great contact with them anytime we need it. The site launched a couple of years ago. I don't remember the exact launch date, but I think it was in late summer.

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

Our agents are particular about how their web presence is and how their properties are represented. Leading up to this project, we had a lot of issues with our website and a lot of negative feedback from everybody in our group. After we launched the site, I had absolutely no complaints from anyone. That speaks volumes, I think. I’ve had some gratuitous feedback from the general public too. When I talk to them, they say we have a great website, which is always nice to hear. I think all around, folks have been happy with it, and I was pleased with the result myself.

How did Aktiv Web Solutions perform from a project management standpoint?

The difference was night and day in terms of ease of supervision between Aktiv and the previous company we had hired. After a while, I found that I had a hard time engaging the same people at the old company because they were always handing us off internally. We had lost our project manager early on, and the remaining team members didn't stay on track. As a result, I had to stay on top of the developers a lot more just to keep the project moving along at the pace that it did. That wasn’t the case with Aktiv at all. They were a small team, so I was still talking directly to the developers but I didn't feel like I had to push them along at all. They set the timeline and they stuck with it.

We mostly communicated via email and phone. Later on, they launched their project site, which kind of gave us a 10,000-foot view of everything that was going on and what was queued up to work on, which was nice. To this day, we still use that project site to submit work requests. They have all the tools in place to manage their projects efficiently.

What did you find most impressive about Aktiv Web Solutions?

For me, the biggest thing is having the personal contact that is always available with a smaller team like Aktiv’s. I think that goes a long way. You don't get lost in the shuffle when some other larger companies come along, which I think is what had happened with the previous group we had worked with—because they had a few clients with household names that they had built sites for. Aktiv did too, but that’s kind of beside the point.

Are there any areas Aktiv Web Solutions could improve?

I don't think so. Because they were a smaller team, when someone got sick or went on vacation, that brought things to a little bit of a halt for a short period of time, but I suppose that just comes with the territory.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work for a membership organization for IT professional organizations, mainly solution providers. We’re also one of the leading providers of IT certifications for people who would like to start or grow their career in IT. I’m senior director of web content services.

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Web Solutions?

We had an area of our website that was aging. We didn’t know exactly what to do with it, and we needed to transform the focus from a very static presentation, a directory of names, to something that was much more pleasing to the eye and more interesting to read. We wanted it to be like the form of a magazine or a book, where someone can get information about the content within that area very quickly and easily.

For this specific project, we had a listing of names. The project wasa collection of 20 years of individuals who were inducted into the hall of fame, which included everyone from Steve Jobs and Bill Gates to some people we have today. It was just a collection of names, and we wanted to transfer this into a museum-type application that would be more interesting to look at.

One of the main goals was to make this something that could live online as well as offline. The project was really divided in those two aspects. We’re hosting this website right now online, as well as on a huge touchscreen monitor within our office which greets visitors. It’s a visually compelling element within the entry area of the company.

What was the scope of their involvement?

There were a few very specific requirements. One that I should mention is that we asked them to do a website that is easily maintainable. We didn’t want to incur any more costs down the road for updating the website once a year. I also did not want to spend a whole lot of time on project management. We were also asking them to make the website look more pleasing, so there was a design element in there. Additionally, there was a user journey element in there as well, and there was also a project management element in there. The time I could spend on the solution was very limited, so we tasked them to cover all of these elements.

It was simply a web application that we wanted to transfer from something boring to something livelier. The conversation I had with them was more around bringing something to life. We were looking for a timeline and an experience that a user would have when visiting a museum. When you see a timeline of a certain technology or development that you see in a museum, and you walk down that line, you would learn as you go. This is very much what we were going after.

There are certain animation features that Aktiv came up with. We provided them an open book of opportunity, as we didn’t want to restrict their creativity. We told them that we wanted to transfer the list of names into a digital museum appearance. That was pretty much all we gave them.

I don’t know how many people were assigned to this project, but I worked with just two people. The business development manager, Chris Kosiba, was my first contact. I had a lead designer contact, and I think he also took a project manager role on this. My contact was limited to these two guys, as we preferred. We didn’t want to have a whole lot of contacts. This was a fairly expensive project, given the scope of it. We really only wanted to have one person to whom we could send questions and get answers. We didn’t want to interface with 5–7 people.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Web Solutions?

It is not easy to find an agency that delivers on all the needs we had. We found that the typical agency has one particular strength, a lot of mediocre abilities, and a few strong weaknesses. For every project, we typically look at our main goal. Is it a project management issue, a programming issue, or a design issue? If an agency fails on any of these items, which ones can we most easily live with? So, we have not found a lot of agencies that can deliver on all those fronts.

When we looked for this project, we looked for someone who had a credible client portfolio and a strength in design that we could rely on. We felt that design and user journey development were critical in this one. We didn’t feel that the programming was that critical because a lot of the programming was available in templates. So, the most critical part was coming up with an idea for the design. We looked at 10–15 agencies and the work they had done. We typically pick 2–3, where we prioritize one and the others would serve as backup.

In this case, Aktiv was one of the frontrunners that we wanted to have because of their strong client list. We looked at solutions they had developed for Intel and for Microsoft. These are the reasons we contacted them and picked them.

How much have you invested with Aktiv Web Solutions?

I think it was somewhere between $35,000 and $40,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Aktiv sometime in 2016, probably the first half of the year. I think it was a 12-week project.

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

There were no KPIs attached to the project. We didn’t have any goals for page views or anything. This was a project that was very dear to the hearts of our executive leadership and our membership. It delivered in the ideal way we were looking for. If you’re working with an executive, you want a service provider to deliver a product that executives are happy with, and that was the case here. They provided designs and ideas that our executives immediately accepted and found as a viable solution for what they were trying to achieve. From my perspective, it went as smoothly as it could go.

How did Aktiv Web Solutions perform from a project management standpoint?

They performed as I expected. They were very independent as far as the development goes. They listened to our needs and demands, what we were looking for, and they understood those requirements. They took on the project management in an efficient way. I sometimes work with agencies that either do not have enough project management experience, and your project starts failing in a lot of areas, or you have agencies that are over-focused on project management, and suddenly you are getting a bill where 40% of the cost is for project management. We were asking them not to do something like this, but to simply do a process of milestone reporting and follow through the project as quickly as possible, and they did that. We’ve mainly focused on milestone reporting and key milestone approvals, and they did that very well. To be honest, I have not found another agency so far in the 4–5 years I’ve been working here that was as effective as Aktiv in project management.

What did you find most impressive about Aktiv Web Solutions?

It’s their independence in taking on a business requirements request, going with it, and delivering a product at the end as required: fully tested, fully functional, and without any major errors.

Are there any areas Aktiv Web Solutions could improve?

No. We were very happy with them. We would like to work with them in the future on projects that are far more complex than this one. There are other projects we would have liked them to work on, but they declined because they were very honest about their capabilities. They told us it was not an area they’re familiar with, and they weren’t comfortable with it. We were grateful for their honesty in this area. I couldn’t tell you anything negative. They worked as we expected them to, and it was a very good business relationship. We still have a very good relationship with them.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Aktiv Web Solutions?

The better you understand what you’re trying to achieve and what your goals are and the better you can explain your business requirements, the better your outcome will be.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We’re an international non-profit that does cultural awareness programs. We have clubs all over the world. I’m the regional support manager for Latin America and program manager for the implementation of the website.

What challenge were you trying to address with Aktiv Web Solutions?

Our biggest issue was a very outdated website. It was very cluttered. it was hard to see the message of our organization when you first went into our website. One of the main things that we wanted to do was to update our website to a more modern look, but also have a more visual website where people could understand what we do without a lot of writing. We wanted the site to be accessible to our existing older demographic but also attract younger members as well. One of our other goals was to recruit people and not make it look like we’ve been around for 40 years.

We had worked with someone local that had their own business, but we were not very satisfied with him.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We gave them the idea that we wanted something that you would know our mission right away. We wanted to make sure it was very visual, user-friendly, and not cluttered. Our old website had a lot of outdated documents. The idea was that phase one was just going to be the structure of it and then we were going to build onto that because we were also working another company building our Salesforce. We are also wanting to do communities with them. The idea is that the website is a marketing tool and then we have a member login.

We’re making changes as we get feedback from our members. We have a member page now that will be taken away once our Salesforce is running and we start communities. We have about 400 clubs around the world. One of the features that we launched with was that you would be able to see the club nearest you. One of the feedbacks that we received from our members was that once you clicked on the map, it got your location and it wouldn’t really let you see where other clubs were. It was just searching clubs near you. People were getting really frustrated with that, so we turned that feature off. The intent was that this is a marketing website, not specifically for members because the member information was coming later. We put it in the footer and because we do have an older demographics they did not see it. They complained about that, so we moved it up. We have a news section and, based on the feedback that we got, a lot of people said it looked a little too much like a blog and not news. We are going to upgrade that page. We have other changes like changing the way a page looks because of the feedback we’ve received. We were on WordPress, so there are some things that we have access to change. Most of the big changes, Aktiv has to do.

I was working with three people, Chris [Kosiba, Client Relations], Gary [Steffins, Creative Director], and Daryl. Chris is the program manager. Daryl did the detailed work, and Gary helped the big picture of what the pages should look like. We went back and forth on what looked good. I was in contact with them every day.

How did you come to work with Aktiv Web Solutions?

I wasn’t part of the hiring process. They submitted an RFP and there were a couple of companies that made a presentation. Aktiv Web Solutions submitted what the home page might look like and our company liked them better than the other companies.

How much have you invested with Aktiv Web Solutions?

We have spent between $60,000 and $80,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

They made a presentation to the board in November 2016, and we started to work with them in January 2016. We’re still actively working with them. Phase one of the website launched in February or March, but we are now working on phase two.  I started working with them in July of 2016.

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

From our membership, we’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback that it looks a lot more modern. It is a beautiful website. It’s very visual with a lot of colors. As soon as you go in you are able to see what our mission is. It is easy to navigate. It doesn’t look cluttered and old. We now look like we are up with the times. We are going to be implementing Google Analytics to see what is successful and what is not successful. The ultimate goal of the website is to recruit new members and to attract them to our organization and find out what we are and who we are. That goal has definitely been achieved. We have Journeys as one of our programs every year, and those are on our website. Those have changed dramatically. I think a lot of people really enjoy the detail that we have put on there, the pictures and the cleanness of it. We have an itinerary that on the website that tells you what you’re going to be doing day by day. It is definitely an upgrade from what we had as well. Another goal of ours was to increase participation or have more people inquire about our programs. We have seen an increase in that.

How did Aktiv Web Solutions perform from a project management standpoint?

It’s hard sometimes when you have something in your mind and you can’t see it in person. It’s good to go back and forth with them. They have good ideas. We have a good work relationship. We have a project site where we communicate. You could see the progress and you could see what’s pending. That really helped with accountability. We did have constant communication, whether it was on the phone, email, or on the project site. They are very understanding if I needed a change. If there was something they needed from me, they kept me on task.

What did you find most impressive about Aktiv Web Solutions?

They really understood our business. It’s hard to bring in a company that can work with the older people in mind knowing that the main goal of the website was to also attract new and younger people. It was really cool that they really understood what we do and were able to captivate it on the website. They were very accommodating in knowing that our company is different and what works for another company doesn’t necessarily work for us.

Are there any areas Aktiv Web Solutions could improve?

With every small business, I think that they have their challenges. There are some things we wish we could’ve changed but we don’t have access to because it was coded a different way. Because I came in late, a conversation about that would have been good since I don’t know anything about web development or WordPress.

What tips or recommendations could you share that might increase the likelihood of success with Aktiv Web Solutions?

With any project, it’s good to know what you want. One of our biggest challenges was that the organization didn’t know what they wanted. Aktiv is easy to work with as long as you know specifically what your vision is. If you don’t, there is going to be a lot of back and forth.