The Awesome Company

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a mobile product manager for a precious metals company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with The Awesome Company?

We had an outdated mobile application and needed to upgrade it. Despite the success of our website, we wanted to enhance our presence within the mobile market.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The Awesome Company built out native mobile apps for Android and iOS. While our internal team designed the app’s initial mockups, their primary responsibility was to develop the platform. Development is 95% complete, so the project will soon enter the QA stage.

The app is a new type of mobile platform with various categories and subcategories of media. It’s a diverse product that features a full scope of video, text, and images. The interface consists of news notifications and widgets that simplify the UX.

Beyond this project, The Awesome Company also helps us support and improve existing products. I can fully trust them to maintain vital technical configurations on both Android and iOS. We’ve hired them for four or five projects, and they’ve performed well each time.

What is the team composition?

They’ve allocated 5–6 people to our account. This includes a graphic designer and developers for both iOS and Android. Their team conducts the necessary QA testing.

How did you come to work with The Awesome Company?

They worked with us on previous projects, so we felt comfortable hiring them again. Initially, I spoke with them about the services they provide and how they approach different tasks. I was satisfied with all their answers, so the relationship evolved from there.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in March 2018, and the engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’re still in the development stage, but I’ve yet to see any significant issues with their code. They’re diligent, productive, and quick. Their development team wields the technical expertise necessary to provide actionable feature suggestions and further improve the app. That collaborative approach fostered a positive relationship between our respective teams.

How did The Awesome Company perform from a project management standpoint?

We started the project by planning out each task, ordering them by priority and dictating how much time it should take to complete each request. Since then, they’ve managed the project internally. Their management team oversees the developers to make sure they stay on schedule. I’m happy with their ability to able to deliver each section of the project within the allotted timeline.

There’s a seven-hour time zone difference between us, but they’re always responsive despite that challenge. They’re available in the evening, so I never have to wait a day and a half for someone to get back to me. If we have any problems or questions, I’ll send them an email or use Slack. They usually respond within 20–30 minutes. We also communicate via Skype when necessary.

As a bilingual team, they speak both Russian and English exceedingly well. That makes QA testing and other interactions with my team possible without having to translate information. Their writing skills are excellent, too, so it’s easy to interact with them.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re honest, transparent, and have their own professional opinions that they don’t hesitate to share. As a result, we gave them access to all of our online systems in case of future IT issues. They handle most tasks without much oversight.

Are there any areas they could improve?

It’d be nice if they offered hybrid development for companies who aren’t interested in native applications.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

I recommend using them. They’re able to help companies improve their situation.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of a development agency that creates websites and mobile apps. We also use outsourced developers for this work. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with The Awesome Company?

We’d had to part ways with a previous vendor that had been developing one of our apps.  They had caused a lot of problems and setbacks in the schedule. I was looking for a new team that could adequately provide the same services.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

The Awesome Company worked with us on an app that supports women throughout their pregnancy. It delivers useful content like videos, texts, annotations, and Q&As with doctors on a weekly basis. Users can upload test results or images of themselves to feature in a digital album. The app is relatively simple, but sending unique content with notifications at the beginning of each week required a complicated structure.

Our specifications outlined new materials and graphics to add or improve and maintenance fixes for the app’s compatibility with update OS versions. Most of the team’s responsibilities involved recovering the app from the un-professional work done by the previous developer. After finishing all the critical tasks for the android app, they also resolved additional non-urgent bugs.

Following the acceptable work done on the Android platform, we requested them to work on the iOS version of the app. The Awesome Company made specific adjustments to account for changes Apple introduced in iOS 11 and the SDK updates. Previously, our app had only been compatible with iOS 8 or 9. The team pinpointed issues to fix and offered recommendations. Together, we figured out what needed to change and what could remain the same.
 
What is the team composition? 

I worked with two project managers from The Awesome Company. Since I don’t speak Russian, this worked much better than trying to speak directly with the developers.

How did you come to work with The Awesome Company?

I found The Awesome Company through a referral. Another development agency who was helping us with a web application recommended them. I reached out to Yevgen (Co-Founder/CTO, The Awesome Company) to initiate contact.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent about $11,000–$12,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from March–July 2018. I will contact them again for some other work and continuous tasks on the above app which they worked on with us.
 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I’m very happy with The Awesome Company’s work. During QA, we fixed any rejections and new bugs that came up. We were quite satisfied with the clean results they delivered.

How did The Awesome Company perform from a project management standpoint?

I was very impressed by The Awesome Company’s project management style. Thanks to their meticulous hour count, we were always aware of the details. They gave us a lot of good feedback on the specs. I really enjoyed the online discussions and problem-solving I experienced with their project managers. Their fluent writing and oral discussion skills in English were very useful.  

We used the Awesome Company’s online communication service to share screens and chat online. Sharing screens on both mobile devices and computers made it very easy to explain what we needed and notice problems on the fly. We used Google Drive and Google Sheets to share data. For emergency feedback, we used Messenger. 
 
What did you find most impressive about them?

The Awesome Company worked quickly and had a good process in place. Their strong communication skills are uncommon among development companies. They were very efficient and thorough about development and reporting. I received reports that detailed exactly how they spent each hour of work. Ultimately, the results were great. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, it was a perfect experience. I was sorry to learn that they don’t have a web development team in-house which is experienced with my specific web development needs. My company mostly does web development work, and I wish I could assign The Awesome Company those projects.
 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the former director of IT for a precious metals company. I was in charge of mobile application development.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with The Awesome Company?

We had 50 stakeholders involved with numerous applications on different platforms. We had a hard time fixing issues with so many consultants managing those applications. This problem prompted us to hire The Awesome Company to maintain our existing apps. We wanted a vendor with wide-ranging expertise on the architecture, Windows, and iOS and Android mobile applications.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

In addition to maintenance, they created and then implemented solutions for iOS and Android apps. One of our applications provided the price of gold in real-time, which supported our business model as a buyer and seller of precious metals. The Awesome Company created an eBay version of the app targeted to users between 45–65 years old. We provided the wireframes and functionality specifications.

What is the team composition?

We interact with the project managers and have worked with up to five developers.

How did you come to work with The Awesome Company?

A friend of ours referred them.

How much have you invested in them?

We’ve spent around $20,000–$25,000 CAD ($15,157–$18,946 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in March 2017 and the partnership is still ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The has fast UX that provides accurate prices in real time. Users are satisfied with the solution and have provided positive feedback.

How did The Awesome Company perform from a project management standpoint?

The Awesome Company is always on budget and have invested more time in the process than we expected from them. The communication between teams is efficient in both English and Russian. Video conferences are short and condense. We record issues in Jira.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team is highly qualified and stands out from other vendors I’ve worked with. They are knowledgeable about technology and architecture, and save us time by communicating issues immediately. I’ve worked with other partners that didn’t push us in that manner because they just wanted the money. Instead, The Awesome Company comes back to us to provide time- and money-saving suggestions.