Cambria Corporation

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president and founder of Study Wizards, a tutoring service.

What challenge were you trying to address with Cambria Corporation?

We had worked with another web design company before, but they weren’t able to meet our needs. We needed another company who could handle our web development and design needs.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cambria Corporation handles our web development, design, and cybersecurity needs. So far, we’ve done three major projects with them, as well as some minor upgrades along the way. They’ve also helped us fix some security issues that we’ve encountered on our site.

The first project we’ve done together involved the design and development of our first website, which only had 10 pages. This was followed by a major upgrade, wherein they worked with our marketing director and in-house web designer and helped us redevelop and redesign the site to help us market ourselves in a stronger way.

The second project involved our site’s migration to WordPress, which we did based on their recommendations.

The latest project that we worked on was a total redesign of the site. We changed the site’s look and feel and organizational structure. We used to have a standard navigation bar, which we replaced with a sub-navigation feature to make the site cleaner, more readable, and easier for users to navigate. We also featured our subject pages in a more visible way so users could find what they’re looking for more easily.

Aside from that, we upgraded our site’s mobile version because it lacked the visual appeal that we were looking for.

Right now, Cambria Corporation is handling our site’s maintenance, cybersecurity, and upgrades, as needed.

What is the team composition?

My main point of contact is Cambria Corporation’s web designer, who’s also in charge of taking care of the communication between our teams.

How did you come to work with Cambria Corporation?

I found them through research, back when I was looking for a local web development company. Their pricing, combined with the fact that they were located in the area near me, was an advantage for me at that time. They eventually relocated to the Philippines, but I’ve not found that to be a concern since they’re still fantastic to work with.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent $12,500 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in December 2009, only around three months after we started our company. The engagement is ongoing.

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

Our website is just incredible — it’s responsive, clean, and easy to navigate. We’ve heard nothing but praise from the people who’ve seen it.

As for quantitative metrics, it’s quite hard to measure where we stand. We used to be an in-home tutoring service, but since the pandemic started, we had to shift to an online setting and alter our entire business model. This made it hard for us to measure the increase or decrease in our revenue. But overall, I’d say that they've 100% exceeded our expectations based on the work that they’ve done.

How did Cambria Corporation perform from a project management standpoint?

Cambria Corporation has been working effectively in terms of project management ever since I brought them in. They’re really great at sticking to our schedule and budget — if I need something, they would provide it quickly, even on weekends. 

We primarily communicate through email, but we also use Zoom for meetings.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Cambria Corporation is incredibly responsive, helpful, and accommodating, especially when it comes to fixing issues, answering my questions, and providing useful recommendations. They’re currently working remotely, but they might as well be in the office next door based on how quickly they get back to us. This really showed me how important our relationship is for them, and I can’t express how pleased I am with their communication.

Whenever we have a problem, they fix it immediately for us. In fact, there was this one time when somebody got into our site and changed its pages. After I called them, they started working on it right away and they were able to fix it within just a few hours.

Aside from that, I really appreciate their flexibility with regard to pricing and payment. The latest project that we did was quite costly for us, but they were more than willing to work out a way for me to pay them on a monthly basis. They’re just generally wonderful to deal with.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I’m not sure there’s anything I can complain about — I’m really pleased with their performance.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Although they will help you flesh out what you need, it would still be a good idea to do your best in figuring out your own needs and what you’re looking for.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president and owner of State of the Art Systems. We provide IT support and programming services to small and medium-sized businesses.

What challenge were you trying to address with Cambria Corporation?

We needed 24/7 custom software development support for our existing client applications.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cambria Corporation came in to provide programming services. They help us with developing, enhancing, and maintaining existing applications for our clients using various technologies, such as C#, JavaScript, and .NET. They also provide some technical guidance and design ideas along the way.

What is the team composition?

I’m currently working directly with one person from the Cambria Corporation team.

How did you come to work with Cambria Corporation?

I was searching for developers online and came across their company. I had a meeting with the owner to discuss my project, and I was left impressed after our conversation.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent between $220,000–$300,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working in January 2017, and our engagement is still ongoing.

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

Since working with Cambria Corporation, there haven’t been any outages or problems with our client applications — they’re all running smoothly. I also received great feedback after demoing the prototype of a new app to an end-user recently.

How did Cambria Corporation perform from a project management standpoint?

Nobody’s estimates are always perfect, but they are really good at delivering according to schedule. The communication has been great, too, despite the difference in time zones — they’re extremely responsive. We primarily use email to communicate, but whenever we need to talk, we do video calls over Skype.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Cambria Corporation is very reliable — they’re always there when I need them, and they get things done when I need to get them done.

Are there any areas they could improve on?

I really can’t think of anything — I’ve been extremely satisfied with their service.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure to communicate clearly your expectations and provide more details about the project until you establish a solid relationship with them.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a tax director at a media conglomerate, which owns a publishing company, a record producer, and a television production company. We also have interests in a logistics company and online education. 

What challenge were you trying to address with Cambria Corporation?

One of our companies sells books to resellers, and in the US, we’re legally required to collect a resale certificate, which allows us not to charge a sales tax. Instead, resellers are responsible for collecting the sales tax since they will later sell our books to end consumers.

Collecting and validating those certificates is time-consuming and costly. We reached out to Cambria and asked them to develop an application that allows somebody with minimal training to validate a resale certificate in compliance with each state’s guidelines. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cambria created a tool that scanned and transposed information from the certificate. The tool determined if the certificate had all the necessary information and if it’s valid at the state level. 

Cambria’s tool can be used by somebody trained on how the software works even though they didn’t have any tax background. After a one-day training, users could verify certificates with the same accuracy as a tax professional. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with Rachelle (Senior Software Developer), and she was the lead developer on the project. 

How did you come to work with Cambria Corporation?

I searched on Google for Philippines-based developers, and I came across Cambria and two other programmers. I flew to the Philippines and met with them to discuss my idea. Cambria convinced me that they could step into the project and develop my tool. 

How much have you invested with them?

We spent more than $150,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement lasted from September 2018–January 2020. 

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

We built a double-check system into the tool to test its accuracy. Another agent reverified the certificate after the tool verified it. This allowed us to see any discrepancy and measure the software’s results against what we historically got from similar vendors in the industry. 

Before we implemented the software, we had an average of $200,000 in penalties whenever we got audited by various states. This was because of our erroneous validation of certificates. Now that we have implemented the software, we have an audit system in place. Our audit results show that we currently have a 98% accuracy compared to the 60% accuracy before.

Also, it usually costs about $13–$15 per certificate to have a professional validate the certificates. With Cambria’s software, we’ve reduced our cost to $0.15 per certificate.

I showed the tool to other tax professionals, and they were very impressed with it. A large accounting firm even offered to license the tool.   

How did Cambria Corporation perform from a project management standpoint?

In the two years that we worked together, I had no negative comments about Cambria’s project management. We had weekly meetings where they showed us development updates. They also provided their feedback on how the tool could be improved and used by our other companies. 

Cambria took my creative idea, transformed it into tangible software, and expanded my perspective. They helped move the project forward and overcome speed bumps.

Rachelle gave life to the project. She was phenomenal in her ability to grasp concepts that she’s not familiar with, such as taxation. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Cambria’s ability to step up to an unknown challenge was impressive. They came into the project with a very limited understanding of what I wanted, and they only depended on how well I can verbalize my vision. Still, they understood a simplistic explanation and saw the bigger picture. Additionally, they could see the project from the customer’s perspective, which is very impressive. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t have anything negative to say about Cambria. On the contrary, I am impressed with everything they delivered to us.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be clear with your vision so Cambria can get the big picture of your idea. It’s not necessary to start the project with all the details identified at the micro-level. However, you should explain what you truly want to accomplish. From there, you can identify the little things and incorporate them into your project. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president of an organization that provides skills and compliance training software.

What challenge were you trying to address with Cambria Corporation?

We needed someone to program our e-learning platform.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cambria Corporation provides us with .NET programming that includes the associated database updates, and additions.

What is the team composition?

On a day-to-day basis, I work with the president of Cambria.

How did you come to work with Cambria Corporation?

Prior to engaging them to do the work they’re currently doing, I used Cambria for custom programming at my previous company.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested more than $250,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The ongoing partnership started in June 2013.

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

We're happy with the quality of work they provide and I don’t have to dot I’s and cross T’s. they do a good job of understanding what previous work was done, and using the same framework to get the look and feel.

How did Cambria Corporation perform from a project management standpoint?

From a project management standpoint, they’re good as they meet all the goals that we’ve set. We mostly communicate through email.

Are there any areas they could improve?

One area they could improve on is they should have more resources available for when we need to get stuff done faster.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

My advice is to just be clear with your expectations, and communicate the expectations timely and effectively. I found that they respond better when I communicate fairly, clearly, and without ambiguity.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the president of Crypton Mobile. We are a custom software company that provides solutions to different companies across the country in terms of text messaging, e-signature, e-vaulting, and artificial intelligence.

What challenge were you trying to address with Cambria Corporation?

We needed help building a custom text messaging platform.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our collaboration with Cambria started in 2010, and the original idea of the collaboration was to build a text messaging platform from the ground up. The platform needed to be proprietary and customizable, so it would allow us to facilitate text messages for companies all across the country that wanted to reach out to their customers. Then the project changed into custom software development for our client companies.

The solution that Cambria developed is well-received by many companies. However, most of them don’t want the off-the-shelf solution; companies want custom software to fit their needs. Over a 10-year period, Cambria’s team has worked on custom software development for each client because everybody wants something different. 

Although a text message may sound very simple, to create and build the software, takes a long time. The customization itself takes even longer since it’s always ongoing. Companies always want to modify what they initially built in the beginning, and they want the program to do more things.

Cambria helps by building a software program that not only can send and receive text messages but also can implement APIs, secure file transfer protocol (SFTP), and web portals. 

What is the team composition?

It depends on the project at the time, but we’ve worked with 3–6 people at the time. We have worked with the owner, senior software developers, lead developers, and many other people from Cambria’s team.

How did you come to work with Cambria Corporation?

I had some software developers from Atlanta back in 2009, and they were not able to continue with the project because it went out of the scope of their expertise. I asked them to find companies that I could interview in the US, and Cambria was one of them.

How much have you invested with them?

So far, I’ve invested $230,000 during our 10 years of collaboration.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started collaborating in June 2010, and we still work together.

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

We measure the success of the collaboration by asking if the solution works or not, if we are able to send messages, and basically measuring how happy the client’s customers are. I still have customers to this day based on what Cambria built — I owe most of my success to Cambria’s work.

How did Cambria Corporation perform from a project management standpoint?

Whenever we need to contact them, we communicate via email, WhatsApp, and phone calls.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’m impressed by their customer service, technical support, and honesty.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There is nothing to improve.

Any advice for potential customers?

Expect fantastic communication from Cambria’s team. They're excellent communicators, so be prepared for that. Sometimes one may think of it as over-communicating, and some may not be accustomed to dealing with a company that can communicate well, timely, and promptly.

Be prepared to respond quickly because they need almost immediate responses in order to move forward with their project. You have to remember, this is a company that is dealing with and balancing multiple projects from multiple companies at the same time. When they need you, you should be ready. They will do the rest.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We’re a senior care referral agency that helps families and seniors find solutions to their care needs by managing a portfolio of options. We match living situations that provide care with families looking for solutions.

What challenge were you trying to address with Cambria Corporation?

I needed to build a database to manage communities and their intake forms. That way, we could collect data about my clients and easily match their needs with the offerings of the communities. Within the solution, we wanted to connect our CRM to schedule follow-ups and continue the coordination process.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They built the entire platform and dashboard from end to end. The final solution represented a bring milestone in starting up the company, so they were responsible for turning my vision into a reality. 

What is the team composition?

We worked with a project manager, a designer, and a developer. 

How did you come to work with Cambria Corporation?

I found them after running a search for partners on the Internet. We interviewed a ton of companies at the start of our search, and they understood what I was looking for while prioritizing our budget.

How much have you invested with them?

We invested about $20,000, which did not reflect the initial estimates they provided. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from Mary 2013–January 2014.

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

This was my first time working with an outside developer, so I didn’t know anything about the process or how it worked. They set me up with a designer who sent me PDFs of what the final site would look like, but I had trouble communicating that I wasn’t happy with the designs. While I was promised a project manager to smooth over communication and language barriers, I was left to communicate directly with the designer. Without any sort of design background, it was challenging to work with them in that way.

Even while I was unhappy with the work, our spend with them was significantly higher than what they’d promised originally. I ended up having to explain my concepts to them repeatedly, and they would charge me for every minute we spent on the phone going over my requirements. I ended up having to trace through all their billing hours to make sure my startup didn’t go bankrupt. In the end, they charged us about 250% more than anticipated. 

How did Cambria Corporation perform from a project management standpoint?

They did try to address issues thoroughly in the beginning— the budget manager tried to stay on top of cutting fees and adjusting based on our feedback. After a while, he became difficult to work with and get ahold of.

Our company, to this day, isn’t using some of the features that we wanted on the platform because they were so poorly built. For instance, we never use the CRM or follow-up email features because they weren’t built correctly. The loading issues and time-out errors made it a disaster in so many ways. Our team has pivoted to handling some of the processes in Excel, which functions as a band-aid.  

What did you find most impressive about them?

The developers had every intention of being helpful. The language barrier and inability to relate to my ideas for the project are where they fell very short. They lacked the proper leadership resources to execute the vision without me having to use billable hours to overexplain my needs. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

The project would have gone better if they provided me with the project manager that was promised at the start of the engagement. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure you know who your point of contact is going to be. You will need someone to act as a translator between your ideas and technical information needed by developers. Find someone to be that middleman for you.