Emote Digital

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

We’re satisfied that the sites individually promote their own brand and have their own brand personality. I don’t think the sites appear to be cookie cutter websites out of the same factory.

We get a lot of positive feedback from our own group. We did some informal surveying. Our customer service team, which deals directly with consumers, has had emails and phone calls with positive feedback. The simple navigation has enabled users to find what they’re looking for.

We had some requirements around shipping where you have to have a minimum of six bottles of wine in a cart to check out. If you go over six, you need to have increments of six. There were some other rules around special mixed packs and more. Some of our team members thought that would be a barrier to shopping for customers, but thanks to the support of our design, we haven’t had any negative feedback on that at all. From a UX point of view, it’s really easy and obvious from the outset on how to shop. No one is shocked at the checkout and then ends up abandoning it.

They delivered one of the sites in October and the other two in November. The fourth website will launch in the next few weeks.

How did Emote Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

They follow an agile methodology and break work into sprints. Brendon and I would discuss priorities and work out a schedule with regard to sprints. I held a weekly phone call with him to review progress and upcoming deliverables. They’d have workshops when we needed to do a deep dive into requirements or design on a particular site or sprint. They use Trello and other tools to track their work. They invited us onto their Trello board so we could see their progress.

I had a very honest conversation with Brendon early on about playing the partner role rather than being a paid supplier.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They focus on customer requirements and honor them. If Brendon felt we were putting a requirement on the table that didn’t make sense or could be done a lot better, he’d consult with us on it. He’s brave enough to challenge me on that. We’re really pleased with them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They follow a formal methodology, but the reporting around that wasn’t always given to me. However, I could get access to it very quickly.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Understand your core objectives, your project requirements, and what the problem is you’re trying to solve. Be really clear on your expectations around delivery and timelines. Make sure they have the capacity to meet your needs.