Cuberto

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of a mobile application business that provides a more efficient way to store and exchange content.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We had a lot of designs, but we wanted them done professionally for our UX/UI. We also wanted a branding guidebook and logo designs.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cuberto turned our original concepts and drawings into a professional UX/UI design with a huge workflow. They also created all of our branding, including our logo, business cards, and email signatures. Their team also came up with guides for fonts and colors.

What is the team composition?

We worked with a product manager, a liaison officer, and their designer. There was a team behind them.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

I found them on Dribbble. I also saw some of their past designs on their website.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from January–March 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We’re very happy with what we received. They set a timeframe of two months, but it took three months to complete as they wanted to deliver the best results. They’ve done an excellent job.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

They had a structured timetable for each task. We communicated through WhatsApp and Slack, which was great. When we message them during the weekend, they replied promptly and delivered results on Monday. We also used Basecamp to exchange files.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I liked how they structured everything. They were extremely flexible and worked around the way we worked. If we wanted to go back to something, they were very willing to do that. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

We didn’t think Basecamp was that great. It’s nothing to really complain about, but we thought Slack was better. While we never asked them to switch, perhaps Slack would work better for future clients.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the project manager of Your Sport Agent, and we are a team of six people. Our company was started by former hockey players who are now businessmen in Russia; they saw a need to create a user-friendly and modern web service for hockey management.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We were looking for a firm that could create a modern design and animation in terms of our concept, and the other challenge was visibility.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cuberto is taking care of everything. The landing page was the first small step and almost acts like a business card for the service. They created the design, and both the front and backend. The main project we are developing is a full web service for hockey players and hockey management within teams, which allows them to communicate. The design is complicated and consists of many screens that are needed for the web service, as well as the whole backend.

What is the team dynamic?

Cuberto assigned a project manager to us, and we met three or four times. We also have an analytics person who we are in touch with on occasion via Skype messenger or Basecamp.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

We found Cuberto through an online search. We initially had five firms we were looking at, but Cuberto were very quick to respond and came to us with a proposal within two or three days after I requested a landing page. They were very straightforward in terms of cost and their timelines; everything was clear. They were not cheap, but the quality of their design and the time estimation was impressive, and we decided to stay with them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in May 2017, and the work is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The main feedback has been that the animation is very cool. Cuberto posted the design on a website and it has been quite popular, and feedback has been very positive.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

There was a lot of discussion in the beginning, but not as much now as they are working on the build. I communicate with two people from Cuberto: their project manager, Kostia, and their analytics person. I am in touch approximately twice a week with the analytics person. In terms of project management, I am currently in contact with Kostia only when we are discussing payment issues, and we use Basecamp to communicate.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Cuberto is very good with design, which is why we chose them in the first place. For this type of design, they have been affordable. The design they created for us is unique and really good. There is always a risk when you decide to go with a trendy and modern design, that you won’t be able to develop it afterward, but they have managed to do this.

I have had experiences in the past where we chose one company for the design, another company for development, and when the development team started to develop, it was a mess. With Cuberto it is one company that does it all, and although the design is complicated, they have managed to do it well in terms of the UX.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Nothing that I can think of right now.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of a startup company. We are making an app to help people learn English words more effectively. Our target audience includes Russian, Turkish, Chinese, Portuguese, and Spanish people right now. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We needed a mobile app developed. We wanted to bring this product to market so students can learn the English language.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They are in charge of all the design of and coding for the app. My team is in charge of major directions. When we want to apply a function or feature, the guys at Cuberto do the job with no problem. They will put in all the features, and from time to time, they change the version. All the marketing is up to my team. Cuberto built the app for both iOS and Android at the same time.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

I tried several agencies and freelancers here in Russia. I tried to find the best team for quality and price. After a couple months of searching, I knew I didn’t want to work with freelancers, so I decided to choose an agency, which was a difficult task. I found about seven agencies through resources in a Russian part of the web, which included ratings for the best app development companies. Cuberto was one of them.

How much have you invested with Cuberto?

We’ve spent $100,000 so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working together in May or June of 2016, and the relationship is ongoing. After they finished the first build, I decided it was better to continue with them than to find an in-house team. The app has launched, and the major marketing campaign will launch in a week or two. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Their work is successful and has helped my company grow. The app has been on the market in Russia for a little over a month now, and we’ve placed a couple of advertisements for it. Right now, we have around 6,000 installs, and several hundred people use it daily. We’ve received feedback regarding the UX/UI, and we have a couple things to rework with Cuberto. They said it’s better to change the issues before we advertise it more. As soon as we fix everything here in Russia, we’d like to scale it to China and Turkey.

What did you find most impressive about Cuberto?

They’re not as big as other companies in the Russian market, who don’t give personal attention because they’re so big. Cuberto doesn’t have that feeling. There are about 30 people at Cuberto, and it feels like they pay attention to your needs. Sometimes, they don’t even ask for money when they change something. It’s unique to work with a boutique company. They provide more personal service.

Are there any areas Cuberto could improve?

We have some fine-tuning to do in the UX. I worry whether they can add more people to my project to fix all the stuff quickly, before the mass advertising. We’ll see how it works out.

Do you have any advice or suggestions for future clients?

I can’t say anything specific. The guys at Cuberto are great. They have one of the best creative teams in the Russian market in terms of the design. I know that in the US, there are a lot of creative agencies; however, in the Russian market, people mostly concentrate on the coding, but we have big problems with the design teams. That’s why I chose Cuberto: 80–90% of their clients are completely satisfied with their designs. 

UPDATED REVIEW

This review was updated on March 21, 2018 by the client. New content is below.

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We needed a mobile application built from scratch.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They did the entire scope for and developed our custom iOS and Android app. However, we had a lot of problems with them after our last review in May, so we ended the engagement in July.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

I read a lot of positive reviews about them. Their portfolios were one of the best on the Russian market, which is why I chose them.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent over $100,000. My partner said they were tricking me and charged us threefold the normal price.

What is the status of this engagement?

We stopped working together in July 2017.

Describe the impact this engagement has had on your business.

They delivered the product, but there were a lot of bugs and they couldn’t fix everything. They couldn’t deliver integrations with several social networks when they transferred the full assets to us. Their quality of work was so poor that we had to spend three months to completely redevelop the app. We even decided to give up the Android version and are just now starting redevelop it.

We also found out that they were using freelancers for our work. The way they worked was really ridiculous for building such a simple app. They used 12–15 programmers over eight months, which is why the code varied so much and resulted in all the bugs we’ve had to deal with. They couldn’t fix all the bugs quickly enough when we decided to check everything and asked them to fit it. Some bugs took a while, while others weren’t taken care of for several months. We ended up having to do it ourselves.

There were also issues with design. After using the app for 1–2 months, users still didn’t understand that they could use some of the backend. The design was cool and everyone liked it, but it was only to draw in other companies. They have designs and pictures on their website that makes them look great, but none of it’s true. I was really disappointed, as were my users. They all had a lot of questions and some left really bad reviews. We kept the apps live as we fixed them. After we resolved the major bugs and crashes, we moved to redeveloping and redesigning everything to make things more simple for users. We’re now 99% finished.

How was project management handled?

They have a good project manager, so I can’t say anything bad about him. I tried not to tell them what to do because I truly believed that they were professionals. I’d hoped they would do everything with good quality. I just asked them to guide me through it since I didn’t understand and told them the general things I wanted.

In what specific areas can they improve?

They should get really good programmers who are professional and not freelancers. There should only be one or two people coding the entire project. If you’re changing programmers every two weeks, it takes time and you won’t be able to check their work. Our partner was enraged when he saw how bad their coding was.

Design itself is not enough and it shouldn’t be used just to get new clients. You can put work in your portfolio and get new clients, but it’s always better to keep your current ones happy. The design should work with the UI/UX and the users should understand the end product.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We provide analytical software, particularly BI [business intelligence] and data mining for the enterprise market. I am a co-founder and the Chief Executive Officer of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We were preparing to launch the new generation of our software platform, and needed to have a redesign for our website and logo.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We worked directly with Cuberto's co-founder, who acted as project manager. He personally redesigned the logo and user interface of our product. Cuberto's team designed our website with a new approach, while at the same time conserving the functionalities of the old page. We retained user management and demo access for the site, as well as sending out emails to customers. We moved to a WordPress CMS [content management system], allowing us to modify any content by ourselves.

Cuberto also worked on designs for printed materials, based on our new logo, including business cards and pencils.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

We first started working with Cuberto 5 years ago. I found Cuberto on a freelancing site, gave them a small task, and was satisfied. Cuberto then worked on our company's old logo.

How much have you invested with Cuberto?

The total cost of our project with Cuberto has been between $50,000 and $70,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our project took around 6 months to complete. We needed it to be ready in time for a conference, where we would be launching our new software. I asked Cuberto's team to rush the work, completing one month early, in June 2016. Cuberto managed to complete a limited version of our site in time, allowing us to start our promotional campaign 2 months earlier. The main page was launched in August.

We continue to work with Cuberto on other tasks. We are expanding the functionality of our site, adding a customer zone, a partner zone, etc.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I presented the new site and logo to friends and business partners from the very beginning. Most of them told me that the site was fantastic, while 2-3 mentioned that it had a Soviet style. After the site was completed, I approached them again, and they told me that it looked great, and that we made the right decision in changing our look while leaving functionalities intact.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

The project was managed quite well. I acted as a project manager as well, and provided my contribution. The work was divided into 4 parts, and Cuberto's tasks were delivered on time.

Are there any areas Cuberto could improve?

There's always something to improve, but I can't specify something regarding Cuberto. Our project was quite complex, but they managed it.

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

I would advise clients to start work with Cuberto's co-founder, even if they move on to another resource later on.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

TradingView is a social network for traders and investors. Our company has been around for 5 years, and is focusing on growing business. tradingview.com is a large site, with over one million monthly users, and over 50 million page views. We are ranked as site number 3,000 in the world by Alexa. We work with major banks, brokers, and exchanges around the world. There are many publications about our company, including on TechCrunch.

I am a co-founder and the Chief Operations Officer of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We had a concept for our platform, and needed resources in order to build it.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cuberto has designed every version of TradingView, as well as our standalone tools. Cuberto was in charge of the whole look of our site, including layouts, colors, and fonts.

I don't work with Cuberto directly, but I've heard great reviews from our Chief Technology Officer [CTO]. We are tough with people working outside of our company. Cuberto is a rare breed of designer; they don't ask stupid questions, and they don't argue about protecting their work, in cases when we don't like something. Cuberto has provided many constructive suggestions on their own initiative, based on an understanding of our own business. Rather than simply being designers, Cuberto's team is made up of user experience experts, handling the whole flow of where things sit, how users will interact with them, what the look will be, and so on.

Our team from Cuberto includes 7 people at the current time.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

I don't know how we came to find Cuberto. Our CTO got in touch with them for a project, probably through a personal recommendation or a search. Eight years ago, things were very different in the online world. The selection process was similar to how we'd choose any other third-party provider. We gave Cuberto a small project and it worked well, so we kept going. We're generally tough on third-party providers, and want them to think like us: in an effective, productive, and proactive manner.

How much have you invested with Cuberto?

I'm not purview to that information, but subjectively speaking, I can say that Cuberto is above market average. As a company, we like to pay more, and get good results in return.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our CTO has known Cuberto for eight years, during which time we've worked on-and-off. Cuberto is working on mockups for our iOS app at the moment.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Many people have worked on tradingview.com for many years. Cuberto is one of the key players, because of their visual work. As I mentioned, one million users visit our site every month, interacting with our tools. Any visual elements were designed by Cuberto.

We've received a lot of feedback from members on our public pages, including Facebook and Twitter, telling us that our website is beautiful, easy to use, and our charts are very well done. This can be attributed to Cuberto's work. We also use Get Satisfaction; people can post complaints and compliments on getsatisfaction.com/tradingview. Looking up compliments will reveal many comments about visual elements.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

Cuberto has performed well in terms of schedules and sticking to our budget. We use many tools internally, including Trello and Jira. Our CTO worked directly with Cuberto's team.

What did you find most impressive about Cuberto?

Cuberto didn't ask stupid questions, they didn't have trouble in accepting our feedback and coming up with creative ideas, and they are proactive in suggesting useful approaches. Lastly, instead of design, Cuberto focuses on user experience. Elements don't simply have to be pretty, but they also need to allow users to get from one point to another in an intuitive way.

Are there any areas Cuberto could improve?

"Do more, faster" is the feedback which we all try to live up to. Quality, time, and efficiency can always be improved. There's nothing glaring about Cuberto that I could cite. We have a good collaboration, and we keep engaging them in new projects, including our iOS app.

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

Our company doesn't engage in micromanagement, and Cuberto isn't a good team for this approach. Cuberto can be engaged when results are needed on a broader scale, rather than working on narrow tweaks. Customers who come to Cuberto with this type of work won't be very satisfied. The same kind of work can be done elsewhere, cheaper. Coming with a broader, conceptual request, like making a site's users understand what a page is about, and letting Cuberto come up with solutions, will achieve success.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Our company has created an international calling application. I am the Chief Operations Officer of the company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We needed to rebrand our application. It wasn't attractive, and we wanted to start over to be more successful in terms of attracting downloads and positive user reviews.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cuberto was involved in branding and mobile application design, including developing a logo, fonts, brand colors, as well as app UI/UX [user interface/user experience] for Android and iOS mobiles.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

We did some research on finding good UX designers for international calling and related applications. We found Cuberto through a Google search.

How much have you invested with Cuberto?

The total cost of our project with Cuberto was between $15,000 and $20,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Cuberto in December 2014. Our project was completed 2 months later, in February 2015.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Our own team was in charge of development, and we only received UI/UX designs from Cuberto. The project was finished before the deadline, and we were very satisfied with the overall design quality. We've received positive reviews from customers on our app's rebranding.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

The quality provided by Cuberto was high, and the time sheet provided by them was good as well.

What did you find most impressive about Cuberto?

We've had a good experience working with Cuberto.

Are there any areas Cuberto could improve?

I can't think of anything.

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

Cuberto is a team of professionals, so working with them will be a good experience.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are a tech company building tools for physicians and patients, as well as other areas of the healthcare industry. I am the Chief Technology Officer of the company. I am in charge of product management and development.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We wanted to re-skin an application which we'd previously developed, changing its user interface and fixing some flaws on both the web and the mobile versions.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cuberto provided UI/UX [user interface/user experience] design for our app, and was also engaged for some refactoring of the backend, in order to improve the performance of our mobile app. They delivered the work on time, and provided good quality.

We have worked with 2-4 resources from Cuberto, as well as a project manager.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

We saw their profile on an online portal, and really liked it. We also had a shortlist of 3-4 other candidates. We interviewed all of them and tried to find the best match for our requirements, focusing more on the UI side. We appreciated Cuberto's design capabilities, flexibility, and ability to deliver the right tools for what we had in mind, which doesn't always happen with a design team. We gave some initial prototype work to Cuberto in order to get a sense of their capabilities. It turned out well, so we decided to hire Cuberto.

How much have you invested with Cuberto?

Cuberto had a cost of $60-80 per hour.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our initial project had a duration of around 3 months, and it was extended with some additional work, totaling 8 months. Most of the work has been completed. We may have some work for Cuberto in the future.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I've been very happy with the work done by Cuberto. The feedback for their work was positive, but I don't have any actual statistics.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

We appreciated Cuberto's flexibility in working based on our requirements. We had a long, drawn-out project, spanning many months, so there were many changes in terms of requirements and focus.

What did you find most impressive about Cuberto?

There were moments of urgency as well, so we needed a team which was capable of responding to that, which Cuberto did. We appreciated this aspect of their work.

Are there any areas Cuberto could improve?

Communication could be improved. Cuberto is an offshore team, and we only had one person of contact. Having more than one project manager available for us would be a good idea.

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

They should focus on gathering requirements and what needs to be delivered. Getting feedback from the developer and monitoring them is also important.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We are an educational technology company based in Sweden. We are about to launch a private mathematics tutor app aimed at the educational segment.

I am one of two founders.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Cuberto?

We aim to put private tutors in the hands of every student, in Sweden at first, and hopefully abroad.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Cuberto designed an iOS, Android, and web app for our company.

How did you come to work with Cuberto?

We screened companies from all over the world, looking for a great designer which had worked on simple and appealing apps aimed at younger users. We found Cuberto, saw that they had created educational apps in the past, and liked their work. We sent an email asking for some references, and came to select Cuberto out of 5 candidates. They were by far the best ones.

How much have you invested with Cuberto?

The total cost of Cuberto's services has been between $90,000 and $100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Cuberto in October 2015. We have an ongoing project. Design has been finished, and we're in the development phase.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We are very satisfied with Cuberto. I don't have any quantitative results at this time. Qualitatively speaking, we received the results that we were looking for in time, and within the estimated cost.

How did Cuberto perform from a project management standpoint?

Cuberto has delivered on their promises from start to finish. Our journey went smoothly, even though we worked out of different time zones. Communication was strictly online.

What did you find most impressive about Cuberto?

Cuberto has been able to think of additional steps, in terms of how users will be interacting with the product. Even though Cuberto hasn't been involved in the development stage, they have recommended useful changes and ideas to us, which we hadn't considered, instead of just sticking to specifications.

Are there any areas Cuberto could improve?

There is always room for improvement, but I've been very satisfied with Cuberto's work.

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

Anyone looking to work with Cuberto should strive to provide detailed specifications. Each relationship of this type can be a 2-way street. Offering something vague will yield something vague in return. If the client does their research, and thinks about what they want in terms of how users will navigate the application, and what functionalities it should have, then it will go much smoother than simply asking for an awesome app.

BACKGROUND

SportsCool is a social network app focusing on the sports industry. It is a tool that combines instant messaging, status sharing, group activity organization, and information searching. With SportsCool, you can find and build your own sports community, chat with your mate, organize group activities, find a coach to improve your sports skill and share your sports photos with your friends.

I am the CPM [certified product manager] of product design.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

The major objective is getting more users, since this is social network project, and work with Cuberto was for a fine UI/UX [user interface/user experience] design, which is critical for a smartphone app.

SOLUTION

We really only needed some UX/UI advice and consulting help. That was the only service they provided. I found them on Dribbble and put them on my short list. I selected them after a brief discussion. I really liked their design and was satisfied with the feeling I got about their aesthetic skills.

The project started in August 2014 and ended in September 2014. We accomplished our goal of improving the design to make it more professional and user-friendly.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Cuberto is the only company we worked with, and it was quite challenge in China to outsource this project to a company we did not know before. But, I will say it was good, and I am willing to do it again if we have the same demands. It is cheaper compared to hiring the same talent in China. If you prepare your UX design, internal process, and the result you want, then the project with Cuberto will work well. It saves a lot of time to be prepared going in to the engagement.