DYODE Inc.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the owner of a men's grooming company. We manufacture men's grooming products and resell them online.

What challenge were you trying to address with DYODE Inc.?

I had a previous website that I built on Big Cartel, back in 2013, which was really outdated and needed a facelift. I wanted to start from scratch and build a new website on Shopify Plus because they had more options and it was easier to integrate with other platforms. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

DYODE basically built the website from the ground up, which took six months. They implemented a subscription service and other key things I was looking for. I had to set up some elements on my own, but they did walk me through the process of getting Shopify apps and how to use them.

We just launched and there were minor hiccups here and there that got overlooked, but they were able to quickly fix them. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with around 5–6 teammates. One of them was a project manager, and the others all had specialized functions, but I can’t remember each one because it's not my expertise.

How did you come to work with DYODE Inc.?

They were actually referred to me by my Shopify Plus manager. I asked him if he knew any good web designers and he suggested them. I looked them up and they gave me a quote to redo my entire site.

How much have you invested with them?

Overall, we spent around $71,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project lasted from August 2020–February 2021.

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

I really like what DYODE delivered and I'm very happy with the website. All my customers love the new site, too. There were a few small issues in the beginning, but they patched them up right away. They did a great job and really helped me out. 

How did DYODE Inc. perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management was great. We primarily communicated through Zoom meetings because of COVID-19 — it was the next best thing to meeting in an office and they were still able to communicate very well. We also exchanged emails and they always responded very promptly, which was really good.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I was most impressed by their quick response times. I always heard back from them within the hour and that's something I really appreciated — it's frustrating when I write someone an email and I don't hear from them for a few days. However, DYODE always answered quickly, even on weekends. They were just really easy to work with.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They did a great job and I really didn’t have any issues with their work —  I don't know how they could’ve made it any smoother.

However, I was hoping to get it done earlier, but I understood why it took as long as it did. I was hoping to get it done in October so that we could have it ready for Christmas, but there was a lot of work that had to be done and a lot of kinks to iron out — in the end, I pushed it back to give them more time to fix things.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Don’t hesitate to hire them — they get the job done and they're good people.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We’re an apparel manufacturer and retailer operating in wholesale, retail, and e-commerce. 

What challenge were you trying to address with DYODE Inc.?

We were migrating from a legacy platform for our e-commerce sites to Shopify Plus, and we engaged DYODE to help us navigate that transition. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

For the Shopify Plus platform, the team has helped us choose the template we preferred than do the actual design work. We’ve gone through many iterations of finalizing the site before it went live. 

We brought them on board to be our marketing agency. The main point was to focus on our paid advertising since we had done very little of that in the past. 

Since we’ve now been in a better position to professionalize our digital marketing, the team uses our new Shopify Plus platform to handle paid advertising efforts. They work with our small marketing team to utilize content and set up the mechanism in order to launch the paid ads. They also provide data analytics on the backend. 

What is the team composition?

Tim (Co-Founder) and I work together. Then, Elana (Manager, Product & Digital Operations) serves as our project manager for the web development portion of things. We also work with Lucas (Manager, Digital Marketing & Analytics) who is our representative for the marketing side. 

How did you come to work with DYODE Inc.?

We were referred to them by another company we’ve worked with, and they were 1 of about 6 agencies we added through interviewing processes and referrals.

Ultimately, we chose them for their ability to understand our particular area of business since some of the founders have come from an apparel marketing background. Furthermore, we were just fit personality-wise, and we liked working with them. Finally, their price was reasonable. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve probably spent $80,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The partnership began in May 2020, and we continue to work with DYODE. 

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

Since we’re a small company and we’re family-owned, there’s a high level of owner involvement in the process, so there has been a lot of non-numeric in terms of the KPIs, look, and feel. The team has delivered the site and the brand message the owner wants. In general, there have been a lot of iterations, but the key to success is that the owner is happy. 

On the numeric side, we get much more involved in the marketing piece of things. We normally monitor the site visits, conversions, and more on a two-week basis to measure our success. We’re still in the early days, so we’re not yet where we want to be, but we’ve been pleased with our progress. 

How did DYODE Inc. perform from a project management standpoint?

Ultimately, no matter what company we choose, it really comes down to how well the person you’re working with manages the project from their side. In our case, Alana has been a pleasure to work with. She’s been very responsive and we’re not too far apart timezone-wise. 

We’re in Hawaii and they’re in LA, so we’ve got 2–3 hours depending on daylight savings time (DST). We’ve appreciated that even outside of normal operating hours they get back to us if there’s a failure on the site. We use Google to share documents. We also use other platforms including Klaviyo where they build content with our internal team live on that site. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their understanding of our industry allows us to easily have a conversation with them. With DYODE, we don’t have to go through detailed explanations of the terms because they get it.

They also understand that we’re a small company and we need them to be understanding of the small team they’re working with. We don’t have an army of people to do things, so they’re really working with us together with the financial elements of that. Simply put, they work hard to make things cost-effective. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

Every agency I’ve worked with struggles with the fact that I’m just one of the many companies they’re working with, so their ability to stay immediately up to speed on issues going on with us is a continuous challenge. I don’t fault them for it, it’s just the nature of the agency of life. 

For example, Lucas deals with a lot of different clients, so when he comes on to our call, he has to remind himself of all the key issues. In conclusion, there’s always an opportunity for agencies to find tools and ways to keep their key contact people up to speed on their client’s unique situations. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Treat them like a member of your company. Sometimes, others have a tendency not to understand the agency life and end up treating the agencies like a slave. They’re not just a machine delivering results for you. There are people on the other side of the phone, and they face a lot of challenges and issues. 

The more you can do and understand how the company works, and once you know what their success factors are, you can help them succeed. That way, they’re going to be much more likely to fight harder for you and give incremental efforts that they might not do otherwise. Essentially, it’s all about building a trust relationship and treating them like the people and the experts that they are. Overall, it also helps get things completed.