Aten Design Group

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of strategic communication for an undergraduate education organization.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We needed to upgrade our websites on Drupal 7 to the latest version because Drupal 7 was end-of-life.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aten Design Group has worked on a website development project. They’ve helped us upgrade to a new platform. We initially consulted with them about the best option, Drupal 9 or Backdrop, and we went with Backdrop.

We went through the typical stages of a web project. First, we did discovery and looked at all the sites we needed to upgrade. We worked with the web developers to access the sites with similar content and modules to see how they were built. Then, they came up with some ideas for what we could do to upgrade them.

Afterward, Aten Design Group worked on accessibility and the types of fixes needed. We developed a process, timeline, and budget with their project manager, and then they started execution.

The websites are informational, so they have a lot of information, events, calendars, and contacts. Each site differs depending on the programs and services offered by our undergraduate education units.

What is the team composition?

We have a core team of two people: a project manager and a web designer and developer.

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

We went through an RFP process. We were looking for Drupal experience, and they were one of the companies that had it.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them in October 2023 and completed the contract in March 2024. However, we’re continuing work because Aten Design Group came in under budget, so we still have time and money to spend.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We haven’t measured data. We’ve measured success in coming under budget and having more time to work together. Overall, all of the units have been happy with the upgrades to their websites.

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

Everything has gone according to our schedule. We have additional time, so we’ll continue our work with Aten Design Group.

We use Jira, Basecamp, emails, Zoom meetings, and a Slack channel to communicate.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They do everything well. Aten Design Group has great team members, which is the key to a successful project. Their staff is excellent to work with; it’s truly a team effort.

Moreover, they’ve excelled at project management and web development. We’ve been really pleased with everything they’ve done.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, we’re very satisfied with them. We work collaboratively to accomplish our goals.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be clear about what you’re looking for in your specifications. Our project has been successful because we have excellent web developers on our team, and the project is only as good as the client is good at setting expectations.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the associate vice president (AVP) of IT systems and data for a nonprofit organization that focuses on addressing climate challenges.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?
We needed support to develop our company's intranet, a website for our internal staff. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We needed to migrate our intranet from our on-premises servers to a cloud host. We also needed to update the intranet's design to reflect our new organization's branding and review our information strategy through UX. We required an intranet to provide our employees with the information they needed when necessary.

Initially, Aten Design Group conducted workshop sessions to understand our staff's needs and our old intranet's strengths and weaknesses. Then, the team created a strategy to organize and structure our information better. Aten Design Group used Figma during the design phase, implementing the recommendations provided. The team worked with our internal design team to align with our company's branding and decided how to tailor it to the staff's needs. 

Aten Design Group delivered interactive mock-up designs and then moved to the development phase using Drupal, creating individual user stories and tasks for each component. The team spent time understanding our CMS interface so that our internal communications team could be able to update the content. Aten Design Group conducted QA, testing, and launch. 

Aten Design Group delivered an intranet with an employee directory with the ability to direct message a teammate via Slack or start a video call with a colleague. The intranet also had a feed with our employee data coming in from Workday, our HR management system, that populated the employee directory and created user accounts. The team also built a single-sign-on functionality. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with around 8–9 teammates from Aten Design Group.

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

We had previously worked with Aten Design Group over a decade ago and reached out to them through conference participation and general awareness from our industry.

How much have you invested with them?
We spent roughly $250,000 on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?
We worked with Aten Design Group from November 2022–December 2023.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I liked the employee directory's ability to directly start a phone call or Slack message — it was a great new feature that streamlined our communication. The intranet also provided better automation of our employee data through a more customizable and easy-to-manage integration with our Workday, managing 1,100 employees' information. Aten Design Group's work exceeded my expectations. 

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

Aten Design Group's project management was very transparent. We had a couple of instances where some deliverables were deferred to a second phase, and tasks were added out of the original budget, and the team was very clear. Deadlines shifted slightly, and the intranet was launched after the original date. Still, Aten Design Group kept in close communication with us, and we had a joint effort to develop a new timeline according to the project status.

We used Basecamp and Jira for project management. Aten Design Group was communicative, and we had weekly Zoom meetings to discuss the project's status. 

Are there any employees from the service provider's team that you would like to give a shout-out to in this review?

Jake (Senior Project Manager) went above and beyond to understand our organization and what we needed from the intranet. He also kept the project on task through all the phases. He did an amazing job.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The amount of time Aten Design Group invested in understanding our organization really paid off in the solution they built for us. I was impressed by their ability to act as an extension of our staff and understand what our staff needed even though they didn't directly talk to them, just a few stakeholders. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can't think of anything for Aten Design Group to improve. 

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I recommend putting a lot of thought into the involved stakeholders during the interview process in the early stage of the project. Ensure you have a wide representation of your team involved. This is specific to an intranet project rather than a public website, but involving our employees was helpful for the final output.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the manager of communications at the Center for Antiracism Research for Health Equity (CARHE) at the University of Minnesota’s School of Public Health. We’re a recently founded research organization that aims to understand, identify, and ultimately dismantle structural racism so all people can live healthy and dignified lives.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We hired them to design our website. Our organization was founded in February 2021, and the university was going through a system-wide website upgrade, switching from an older version of Drupal to a newer version. The university didn’t have the resources to make us a website that aligned with our needs, goals, and upcoming plans for ongoing web development and web-hosted projects. Therefore, we had to find external contractors and found Aten Design Group.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aten Design Group has developed our website from the ground up. They used Drupal to build the site’s backend and also created templates and designs to enable our in-house team to update the content easily. 

The website’s purpose is to highlight our work and connect with racialized communities. The homepage includes our message and values, and Aten Design Group also built an interactive partners map. This feature contains a map of the US broken up by our advocacy, community, funders, healthcare, or research partners. Our community and partners can search this map for projects and organizations doing anti-racism work based on geography and the type of work. 

The university hosts the website, and we have a secondary contract with Aten Design Group to provide ongoing maintenance and build planned features down the line. Additionally, they do accessibility reviews and run iterative projects to ensure the map feature is accessible. 

What is the team composition?

We’ve worked directly with 5–10 teammates from Aten Design Group, including Kathryn (Senior UI/UX Designer) and Andrea (Senior Project Manager). In total, 23 team members have worked on our project. 

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

My colleague found them by doing a ton of research into different companies. We wanted someone with good design chops and who was used to working with scientists. Our provider needed to understand data visualization and be able to build an academic project in an accessible way while making it pretty and engaging. 

We found Aten Design Group, and they had a really impressive portfolio and had worked with a bunch of organizations doing big data visualization projects. We chose them because they could handle our immediate needs and plans down the line. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $80,000–$85,000 so far, including the website and the first few months of maintenance. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in March 2022 and launched the website in September 2022. We’re now contracting with them for maintenance and further development, so our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

This project set out to connect with people we respect and those who need resources, and the site is already doing that even though it only launched a month ago. Among our circles, the site is definitely making a buzz. Aten Design Group has made the site beautiful, accessible, and interactive — it's gorgeous. Moreover, the site aligns with our values and the messaging we want with our communities, particularly racialized communities that big institutions haven't always prioritized. We have rigorous research we want to divulge, and now we have a place to point to. 

We launched the website a month ago, and we've had over 1,000 unique users and gained 500 new Twitter followers. Additionally, we've seen a huge increase in positive outreach; researchers, journalists, and community members have proactively reached out to work with us or congratulate us. Journalists, in particular, have reached out to me to say they love the website and find useful information on it. 

The site's design is clean and simple, and we love the color scheme. Kathryn has been amazing; we had a lot of back and forth, and she held our hand during the iterative process until we landed on something we really liked. The feature we most love is our interactive partners map – it's pretty and makes our hearts happy. 

During the first eight months after our organization's funding, we didn't have many resources to make this happen. Then, we found Aten Design Group, and they've made everything work for us, which has made us so happy. Overall, we've had a really good experience working with them. 

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

They've done an excellent job with project management. On our side, my team has had unexpected hardships that have made it harder to reach professional obligations, and Aten Design Group has been easy to work with through these situations. They've kept us updated and on track and have communicated with us. During meetings, we can tell them we're going through a hard time, and their team always treats us like humans, and I'm really appreciative of that. Thanks to the team, the project has never felt out of control or in trouble despite our hardships. 

During the site's development, we had weekly Zoom meetings and used Basecamp for project management. Now, our meetings are down to monthly post-launch consultations. We also use Slack and Jira as tools. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Aten Design Group's biggest strength is that they know how to work with passionate people and mission-driven organizations. When we started, we didn't just need a product; we needed a product that aligned with our values and goals, so we had a lot of pressure on us. Aten Design Group has worked within our mission and for our vision to help us achieve our goals. 

Moreover, they're good and decent people. We're living through the COVID-19 pandemic; things are hard, and knowing we can lean on a team that's honest and shares our values really makes a difference. They don't only build beautiful things well, but they also make us feel like valued partners — they care about us. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can't think of anything they need to improve; I'm a satisfied customer. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I'd advise you to reach out to Aten Design Group. We're not tech-savvy, and they've really held our hand through the process. Figure out what you need them to do, and they'll tell you what they can do and how.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the deputy director of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival. Human Rights Watch is an NGO in over 90 countries worldwide that monitors human rights and presses for change. The film festival is part of it — it shares human rights stories and tries to encourage audiences to take action.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

Our website was over 10 years old and running on the outdated Drupal 7 version. We needed to upgrade our site to be on the latest Drupal software. We also wanted to ensure that our film festival website had an accessibility audit to ensure that audience members with disabilities would be able to access our films and programs.

Another challenge we faced was that film festivals took on a new form during the last three years. Now, they’re taking place in person and online. For example, our screenings were in New York City, London, Toronto, and Los Angeles. However, digital screenings were available across the US. We didn’t know how to explain to the audience how they could see the films and multiple entry points.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aten Design Group came on board to sort out the best way to communicate all of our festival’s offerings and ensure that our website was available and accessible to show the information on mobile devices. We had to completely redesign the site’s structure and migrate it to a new Drupal platform. They updated our visual identity on the website, so they worked on design and development. Additionally, they took feedback from our audience to come up with a completely customized model that allowed us to showcase and feature everything we wanted.

What is the team composition?

We worked with 23 members of their staff.

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

We did an RFP for our previous website, and they stood out. After doing a project with them, we knew they were accountable, prompt, and on budget. They could provide the flexibility and creativity we needed for this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began the project in June 2021, and the website was completed by December 2021. However, we’ve engaged them on an ongoing basis for site maintenance.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

About 50,000 users have used the site since it launched in December.

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

Their performance was absolutely brilliant; they were experts. We had weekly meetings, and they were transparent about meeting the project’s goals and communicating any challenges. Also, they stayed entirely on budget. We were happy with their excellent project management.

They used Jira and Basecamp, and we communicated through email. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They were excellent problem solvers. Aten Design Group navigated our uncertainties on how to communicate the range of events we were holding. Also, they stood out for their project management skills and transparency. Their team communicated daily throughout the process and showed us how they were doing, the challenges they faced, and their plans to solve them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can’t think of anything.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

In order to have a project that you feel proud of, you need to devote the time to ensure you’re communicating clearly with them. Aten Design Group looks to collaborate with their clients and is receptive to feedback. In the end, they led us to a great outcome. It was completely customized to what we needed, and it couldn’t have happened without flexibility and communication on both sides.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of enterprise marketing for Surgery Partners, a company that owns and manages short-stay surgical facilities. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We tapped Aten Design for their web development services.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aten Design has built websites for us, including our corporate website. We’ve branched out from there and created several other websites for our hospitals, ambulatory surgery centers, and physician practices. The team has worked on creating similar designs while giving each website a unique look.  

Moreover, Aten Design has organized the sites’ backend using Drupal; we’re using Pantheon for hosting. This way, our sites have a single upstream capability — we can make updates and changes to multiple sites at once. Their resources have added UX design features to the sites, too. 

In terms of features and functionality, we want our core website to spread awareness about our company and services. Apart from that, we use it to find partnership opportunities. We capture leads through the contact forms for our surgical facilities while providing information to patients and medical providers. 

Further, Aten Design has built an application portal where patients can log in and get necessary registration forms. Using this portal, the patients can communicate their medical history with our nursing staff and other providers. This way, they won’t be bogged down by a bunch of paperwork and questions on the day of their surgery. 

What is the team composition?

We work with an account representative and Janice (Director of Project Manager), who manages our day-to-day needs. The web developers handle the website and its backend, while the project manager manages developers’ schedules. 

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

We found Aten Design through a professional referral from somebody we’d worked with in the past. As soon as we looked into the team, we knew what they’d created for their other clients — it was exactly what we were looking for, so we hired them. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $80,000–$100,000 on our initial project. From there, we’ve had the team on retainer for $70,000–$90,000 per year. In total, our overall investment is around $600,000–$700,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

Our partnership started in January 2017, and the engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve seen significant improvements in our traffic, site speed, and navigation. Overall, Aten Design has met our expectations. 

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

The team always meets deadlines and does things within our budget. Their communication is strong whether it’s via phone, email, Slack, Jira, Basecamp, or Teams. They’re willing to communicate in a variety of formats to ensure that they can get a hold of us when necessary. 

Moreover, they always make sure we know where we are in terms of budget. If something needs to be done right away, they communicate it with us. We have the flexibility to dip into our hours for the next month so we won’t go over budget. This flexibility has been truly useful for us since we need to be strict with our budgets. 

Further, having a core group of developers has been truly helpful for us. We don’t have to re-teach and onboard new developers all the time. Aten Design’s resources have organized a ticketing system for us, too, and it’s been a game-changer. 

Having more than 120 websites, we have the daunting task to keep them updated consistently. The ticketing system automatically creates tickets from emails coming from our facilities across the country. The tickets go to the developers’ queue, and the manager organizes and prioritizes those tickets from there. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Project management is one of Aten Design’s strongest skill sets. We have an excellent project manager — I don’t know what we’d do without Janice.  

Are there any areas they could improve?

They should keep the same pool of developers on each of our websites so that the resources have the familiarity with our CMS and how our sites communicate with one another. To be fair, they’re quite good at this, and they know how vital this is for our company. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be clear about your end goals. Aten Design has the skill sets, knowledge, and experience to meet your goals. Given that, be decisive on what you want to accomplish — they’ll help you navigate a path to get there. I understand that it’s sometimes difficult for a company to truly know their end goals. Nonetheless, you can trust Aten Design to get you there if you know your goals ahead of time.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the department head of information technology and web services at the University of Colorado.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We needed a company that could help us migrate our site from Drupal 8 to Drupal 9.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We initially hired Aten Design Group to help us migrate our website from Drupal 8 to Drupal 9. This involved moving our entire web presence and making sure that we had continuity in our service and that all of the details and page content were moved fluidly. We also had to do a lot of cleanup from what we had in the previous iterations of Drupal.

Then, after our UI/UX developer left for another job opportunity, we engaged Aten Design Group again as an operational help until we got another UI/UX person back in our group. Aten Design Group helped us a lot with the backlogs that we had for the website. We already had preexisting themes and UI templates built out, so a lot of their work involved helping us transition some of the underlying frameworks and such. They did help us with some UI/UX capabilities — they helped us implement new view options for our new databases list.

Aside from that, we worked with them to bring prominence to new and trial databases that we would add to our collections so that our users would have a nice sorted list to draw attention to the trial database. They also helped us with some post-migration and formatting issues.

What is the team composition?

We worked with a project manager and a senior developer from Aten Design Group.

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

We came across Aten Design Group at a Drupal conference.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent around $40,000. The initial website migration project cost around $20,000, and we paid another $20,000 for our work extension this past year until this month.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from June 2021–May 2022.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Overall, we had a pretty smooth migration. We migrated the website from Drupal 8 to Drupal 9 within a 30-minute window, which was fantastic. Aside from that, working with Aten Design Group enabled my team to get some of the backlog projects cleared and out of the way, especially since we moved to Drupal 9. A lot of those previous issues had been cleared up with the migration to the newer technology as well, but there were still a few lingering items that we were able to resolve thanks to Aten Design Group’s help.

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

Aten Design Group was outstanding in terms of project management. They established clear communication. Whenever we came across issues, it was really easy to hop on a call or chat with them and sort them out really quickly. Having our project hosted in Basecamp also helped a ton in terms of our back in forth.

Overall, I couldn’t be happier. It was a definite change working with how they’re set up as a vendor versus other companies that I’ve worked with in the past. After every weekly meeting, our project manager sent us weekly recaps, and they were really clear about follow-ups on our end and their end. They always made sure that we met our deadlines, and that was crucial to the success of our projects.

We primarily communicated with them through Zoom, email, Slack, and Basecamp.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The thing that differentiated Aten Design Group was their commitment to us and our projects’ success. I was really impressed that we had a project manager assigned to us as a customer. That really smoothed out a lot of the operational questions that we had or anything that came up in the project. They were very quick on either getting that information back to us or getting us in touch with the right people to give us answers. This made me really feel valued as a customer, knowing that whether our work mode shifted, they were there to help us out. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I really don't have anything to criticize them on.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a developer at the IT department of a library on a medical university campus.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We hired them to help us update our development environment for me to have more of a continuous integration approach to my development work.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aten helped us update our development environment. I had been developing the library website for a year, and they enabled us to use Lando and Docker to store the database and files in our repository. That way, my colleagues could work on the website as well. Other key technologies used were Git, Composer, and Drupal 9. From there, they helped me move the site to the proper environment to ensure everything was working before launching it.

What is the team composition?

We worked with a few people because they had a whole team coordinating the work. I mostly worked with Jordan (Senior Developer), who helped me get the environment set up, and his supervisor Matthew (Senior Developer Manager), who helped when Jordan wasn’t available. Additionally, I worked with Sally (VP of Client Services) and Aundrea (Senior Project Manager). 

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

I went to graduate school with a former employee of theirs. I also knew about Aten because I’m a librarian, and Aten works with many libraries around the country and sponsors Drupal webinars and conferences. I’ve worked with Drupal since 2013, and I’ve been attending Aten’s webinars for years. 

My supervisor also knew about Aten, so we wanted to go to them first when the need arose. Moreover, they were local, and we knew other people who had worked with them and that their work was good. I felt lucky that they could help us because I already liked them. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from November 2021–March 2022.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I’m happy with Aten’s work. Previously, my development work was a very slow process, and the solution has advanced my ability to deliver faster. The team did everything we asked them to do and more. Not only did they help build the environment, but they also helped with theoretical and practical knowledge. During our first meeting, Aten knew what we needed and helped us work through the terminology and how the process would function. 

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management was perfect. We used Slack to communicate and Basecamp for task management. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

I was impressed with Aten’s communication skills and expertise. Jordan usually had the answers for us, and if something came up where he didn’t, he would tap into the knowledge of the entire development team. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t have any constructive feedback for them; they’re a great company. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Ask all of the questions! Even if you think the question is dumb, ask it so that you can learn everything that you’re there to learn.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of marketing of a publishing company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We needed help in redeveloping our site; many users used to get lost in our platform, and we had high bounce rates.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?                                                                                                                                                                                                  Aten Design Group is redeveloping and redesigning our Drupal website. We started our engagement with the general site maintenance to address any issues, and after that, we decided that we wanted to take advantage of their skillset and expertise, so we started with additional projects with their team.

For the design, we wanted to work with what we already had because we like it, but they’ve made suggestions around accessibility matters and navigation improvements, which have been helpful. 

In terms of the development, they first did a complete UX and PURE review of the platform to look at the different problems we had, and consequently, they started enhancing the site. Some features include a complete main navigation bar redesign and account accessibility components, significantly impacting our website.

We’re currently working on changing their scope of work for next year, which will include maintenance and continued projects.

What is the team composition?

We’ve been working with six members of their team, including a project manager.

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

We were referred to them by a company that knew about our work. After contacting different providers, we decided on Aten Design Group because they seemed like the best fit for us. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $100,000 with them so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in December 2021, and the engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’ve made significant improvements on our site based on heat mapping recordings, bounce rates, and Google Analytics. Overall, we’re 100% satisfied with their work, they’ve exceeded our expectations, and we enjoy working with them so much!

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

The project manager that they assigned to us is amazing and the reason that we’ve initiated more work with them. We’re a small company, so having the ability to outsource project management is great for us. In terms of communication, we use Basecamp, and we also have constant check-in and administration calls.

What did you find most impressive about them? 

Their specialization in Drupal is vital for us. Still, their expertise and project management approach are also unique — they’ve brought an impressive team who can help us with any particular aspect of the project.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t think there’s anything they can improve on. 

Any advice for potential customers?

Be sure of what you’re looking for and the specifics you have in mind. Also, ensure that you have a conversation with them to tell if they’re the best fit for you.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the website manager for a community college.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design?

We needed to rebuild our website from the ground up along with its hosting, CMS, SEO strategy, accessibility compliance, analytics tracking, and design. In order to create a better, more informative website that could help our prospective students, we hired Aten Design.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We started with a website audit to understand where users were going, how they were interacting with the site, and if there was anything wrong or missing. Aten Design got access to all of the reviews and analytics, and we also provided them with the branding material and media for the design.

The team went on to create new functionalities for our website, one of which could allow us to link directly to any program that we’re promoting in our college catalog. A lot of development time was spent making sure that that was in place. 

Aten Design also created a document resource library within the website that could store and sort files by size. They used Drupal as our CMS and made sure that we were compliant in terms of accessibility. 

What is the team composition?

The number of people that work with us depends on what bucket of the project we’re focusing on. We bring in more people as needed. 

We initially interacted with the salesperson and then got assigned a project manager and around three engineers. As we went, we ended with a rotating stable of 10 people. 

How did you come to work with Aten Design?

We have some strict rules in higher education, so we went out to RFP. We received over 25–30 responses before following through with the interview process. In the end, we awarded that contract to Aten Design because they naturally rose to the top with their impressive work approach and portfolio.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $250,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We formally started around June 2020 and we’re still working with the team.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We don’t use any traditional KPIs; we’re simply looking into making an improved version of our previous website. From what we’ve seen, the current website has an improved experience over the last in terms of speed, structure, and authoring environment. The overall design of the website is just so much better.

The integration that allows us to connect with the catalog saves us costs as we’re now able to promote the most current degrees and programs. That Aten Design used an open-source CMS is also a big deal since it allows us to develop and iterate more in the future.

How did Aten Design perform from a project management standpoint?

Aten Design is top-notch in terms of project management. They are a terrific, dedicated team that is super responsive and quick to find answers. We meet at least twice a week and their performance merits nothing but great marks on my end.

We use Slack, Jira, and another project management software that we use within the college.

What did you find most impressive about them?

What’s most impressive about them is their ability to collaborate and make sure that we’re getting the exact custom solution that we need. Whenever we have to go back to the drawing board, Aten Design is a good sport about it. They’re very professional and knowledgeable.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There's always something that they can be better at, but so far, nothing stands out.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure you truly understand what you want to get at the end of the project. Be very clear at the beginning because it helps everybody when you are firm about what you want. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president of the Johnson O’ Connor Research Foundation, a nonprofit organization that does aptitude testing.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Aten Design Group?

We needed to replace our old bar graph program, which is where we put all of the results of each person’s aptitude test. The program would generate printouts of the results, as well as a report that provides detailed information.

Additionally, we were also using separate programs for accounting and scheduling, so we needed a platform that would encapsulate all these tasks, including accounting and research.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Aten Design Group provided us with custom software development to build and design a cloud-based program using the Drupal platform. They’re still working on the project, but essentially, we’re looking to move into a maintenance contract with them to manage bugs.

What is the team composition?

We’ve been working with them for two years now, so there have been some staff departures. Currently, we have a project manager, a backend programmer, and a frontend programmer. 

How did you come to work with Aten Design Group?

One of my colleagues recommended Aten Design Group to us, after they’ve heard of them. We were getting bids from a number of different companies, but some of them thought our project was too small, so they declined to submit a bid. The great thing about Aten Design is they focus on working with nonprofits, so that made them very attractive to us.

Furthermore, when we talked to them about what we needed, they already understood the challenges of the project from the outset.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested about $500,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our ongoing partnership started in November 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We work together on developing a product that can mediate better results, and provide a more sophisticated analysis to the client — so they were getting more than just the sum of its parts. Our old program didn’t provide an adequate summation of what our clients were hearing, but we’ve had a few people say that they don’t even need a face-to-face meeting anymore, because this new program is clearer and more efficient.

How did Aten Design Group perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve had two different project managers with two different styles, and we've enjoy working with both. The current project manager is very communicative. We meet once a week, and then she’ll send updates about what we talked about on our calls. The program did take longer to develop than we initially thought, but it wasn’t their fault once they realized how complex the report part of the program was — so they added more time to the project.

Regardless of that, we’ve been happy with how they’ve been handling the project, and they’ve been very clear about any changes that had to be made. 

We mainly use Slack and email to communicate, and JIRA to manage the project.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’m impressed by how they go above and beyond to overachieve our expectations.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I can’t really say anything about it, because despite the project being more complex to develop, it wasn’t their fault. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I would say to communicate every step of the way. Weekly meetings really help because they make sure that what you say, is what they will hear.