Dengun

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder of Vote In Or Out, a social media platform for politics. We crowdsource research and facts on politicians that are running for office.

What challenge were you trying to address with Dengun?

There was no easy way to find information on candidates on the internet. For instance, it would take hours to find a candidate’s thoughts on guns. As a result, we wanted a platform that users and voters could use to learn about candidates so that they could make more informed decisions when electing officials. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

I gave Dengun a completely fleshed out design of the platform, and their main task was the engineering and creation of its desktop and mobile versions. After I delivered the design brief and files, they developed and launched the MVP. They had around six months to launch that heavy first iteration. They recommended using Flutter since it was a quick way to create the platform and link its frontend to its backend. 

After that initial release, we’ve been slowly adding features to the platform to improve it over time. It's similar to Twitter in that users can post research around candidates while others can partake in that information. Voters can also add more to it if they want. 

What is the team composition?

In the beginning, we had one product manager, one tech lead, 2–3 backend engineers, and 2–3 frontend engineers. It was always a tight, small team. After the initial launch, we’ve been working with two backend engineers and a frontend engineer with one project manager. 

How did you come to work with Dengun?

I had a friend who owned another company, and they were working with Dengun. At that time, we were having troubles with fundraising, and we were running out of time because the 2020 elections were coming. After they heard about what our platform does, Dengun stepped in to do the work. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $70,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started the project in October 2019, and it’s ongoing. 

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

Dengun has created a complex platform that functions perfectly — it’s almost pixel perfect. The platform is flawless and frictionless, and their team is excellent. Success is hard to quantify unless one works in the industry, but I’ve been a designer for 20 years and worked with a lot of engineers, so I know what to be impressed about. 

How did Dengun perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re amazing. I’m not the most hands-on designer around, and I leave a lot of the guesswork to them because I don’t have the time to write proper documents. Dengun fills in all the blanks and is meticulous about how they organize everything. On top of that, they hit their deadlines.

They’re also super-efficient in the way they communicate. We meet or have a Zoom call every week, but we mainly communicate through the project management task board. They’re on Slack so they answer immediately, and I like communicating with them because they’re nice. For project management tools, we use ClickUp. It has a high functionality but it’s not costly, so it fits our budget. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

There’s a saying about the triangle of time, money, and quality: you always have to give up one. With Dengun, I haven’t had to give up any of those, and that makes them stand out. They’re all-stars all around, and they’re truly nice. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there aren’t any. I’ve never had anything to complain about with Dengun.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

As general advice, document everything well so that the Dengun team has a full understanding of the project. Then, they’ll have everything they need to build the deliverable.