Freshdesign

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work for an innovation group within a software company. I am the product lead for an employee directory solution.

What challenge were you trying to address with Freshdesign?

Our application was outdated, so we needed to significantly update the user experience. We were also planning to build a native iOS mobile app, but we didn’t have any iOS design skills in-house.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Freshdesign worked on our web UX, as well as the UX and design of the mobile app. Previously we did most of the web app UX design internally, with the help of a contract graphic designer. We didn’t work with any other UX resources.

We used an existing application during kick-off calls. After I walked their ‎CEO and UX Strategist through the application, we talked about what we were looking to achieve and ran a modified design sprint. The CEO, myself, the general manager, and a few other internal people came up with different visions of the updated app experience. We met and figured out how to move forward.

What is the team composition?

We have worked directly and solely with Raj.

How did you come to work with Freshdesign?

I worked with Raj when I was at another company and was familiar with his design work. I reached out to him, so the project was his to lose. I didn’t contact any other companies.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project ran between October 2016 and March 2017.

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

I would give them five out of five stars. We’re happy with the outcome, and we’ve received positive user feedback. The biggest impact of the redesign—and the actual motivation behind it—was from a go-to-market and sales perspective. The redesign, which had a much more modern UI, made a big difference in sales conversions.

How did Freshdesign perform from a project management standpoint?

They use Basecamp, complemented with Slack, for project management. We handled coordination over Slack and used Basecamp for sharing deliverables like updated designs, style guides, and sketches.

Most of the work was done remotely, but we met for some kickoff meetings and Raj came in a few times.

What did you find most impressive about them?

One of the challenges of contract design is maintaining ownership of the approach and aesthetic. It’s a tricky balancing act to manage constraints and client expectations while advancing the project. Raj has done a good job.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I’m not a big fan of Basecamp, which they used. This is more a reflection on Basecamp than on Raj.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

It’s key to set expectations and constraints up front. We sometimes weren’t clear enough about our constraints and then had to dial back designs that Raj came up with. Being clear wasted less effort and helped us move faster.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work at Facebook. For the past three and a half years, I’ve been developing internal tools for our software engineers. These assets allow them to test applications and to shift and review code. The products I build make sure everything runs smoothly for both end consumers and in-house employees.

What challenge were you trying to address with Freshdesign?

At the time, we were grappling with internal resource constraints. The volume of inbound work was outpacing the realistic capacity of our design and consulting teams. We hired Freshdesign to create the design for an internal software assessment tool.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our tool displays software efficiency metrics derived from the actual product being assessed. It yields data analytic reports indicate how quickly our applications are running. We tasked Freshdesign with creating a design that encapsulated the defined problem, scope, and internal user feedback. Their main objective was to produce a design deliverable for our engineers to implement in-house.

What is the team composition?

I only worked with Raj (CEO, Freshdesign). He’s experienced in enterprise design for data-heavy products, rather than the usual consumer-facing web or mobile variety.

How did you come to work with Freshdesign?

I had known Raj (CEO and UX Strategist, Freshdesign) previously. He had consulted at Facebook a few years ago before setting up his company. We considered one other vendor, but it was much faster and easier to get started with Freshdesign based on our existing relationship.

How much have you invested with them?

Freshdesign’s services cost between $25,000–$50,000 for this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with Freshdesign from September to December 2017. The project took three months from start to finish. We had the option to engage them for more time and scope.

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

Freshdesign produced a design that worked well for us. Their final deliverable was highly functional, visually appealing, and didn’t require notable modifications. In our industry, it’s often hard to predict every potential edge case and the volume of inbound data that will be flowing into a product.

Our software has to flexibly expand to hold additional types of data and actions. This is a one my major forms of criteria, and their design passed the litmus test. We can use it as a foundation instead of starting over with each new type of inbound metric.

How did Freshdesign perform from a project management standpoint?

The CEO always responded within 1–2 days. He came into our office once a week and was willing to meet in-person more often if needed. We conducted all other meetings via video conferencing. Our in-house team delayed the timelines more often than not. It took us a long time to gather internal feedback.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team is patient and skilled at communications. He makes a concerted effort to thoroughly understand our requests. The CEO’s open availability made us feel comfortable contacting him at any time. Freshdesign works through every problem until we’re all on the same page.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I would have preferred more documentation about specific formatting and the range of certain inbound metrics flowing to the interface. Feature requirements or user stories would help specify all the tasks this software is designed to accomplish.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

I don’t have any advice at the moment.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm a principal product manager at an energy investment platform. My job is to work with our customers, analyze our competition, and set the requirements for the engineering team.

What challenge were you trying to address with Freshdesign?

We wanted to make sure we offer good user experience to our customers, so we were looking for a vendor to handle UI/UX design for our platform.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We wanted our customers to be able to easily create tasks and analyze all their projects when they log into the platform, so Freshdesign met with our customers to get their feedback. Then, they built the wireframes and helped us with the administration of settings. They're focusing on the user experience side and assist us with organizing the user flow.

What is the team composition?

We primarily work with one designer.

How did you come to work with them?

We were referred to them.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with them in 2015 and the relationship is ongoing.

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

They deliver top-notch designs. They understand how business works from the users' perspective and have great ideas about structuring the user flow and the designs. Also, they're great listeners and ask us questions until they get all the answers they need.

How did they perform from a project management standpoint?

They work remotely most of the time, but we also have face-to-face meetings. They're very responsive. When we ask them to do something, they fulfil our requests within hours or the next day, but it never takes longer. We use Basecamp to communicate, submit requests, and upload designs.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re great at understanding our business needs and meeting them through their designs. Also, I appreciate their timeliness.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

They're part of our team and we can ask them anything because we know they'll give us a good answer.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder and CEO of eZdia. We’re a content creation platform, primarily for e-commerce.

What challenge were you trying to address with Freshdesign?

We needed UI/UX design for our content creation and management SaaS platform.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Our platform is an enterprise level SaaS platform. When we wanted to bring it to market, it had its limitations. We needed to simplify the UI to lead us to a more DIY model, rather than having to train the users on how it works and how to use it. We wanted to be able to consolidate the learning from different companies and put one product out in the market that could provide a solution.

What is the team composition?

We work with Ylva (Lead UX Design Consultant), who is good and we like working with her. We also interact with Raj (CEO &UX Strategist). They’re both very thoughtful. They’re able to understand our requirements and articulate that into the concept and wireframe.

How did you come to work with Freshdesign?

We found them on LinkedIn. It was our first time using an outside firm as previously, we had someone in-house doing all the design.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them in August 2016 and the relationship is ongoing.

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

The quality has been good and we’re pleased with their technical work.

How did Freshdesign perform from a project management standpoint?

They’re very responsive. We meet with them in-person once every two weeks or whenever we need them to. We use Slack for communication.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They have worked within our budget and it has been good.

Are there any areas they could improve?

At this point, no. They already fixed any issues they had.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure you have clear requirements. They are responsive, and we have enjoyed working with them.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the former head of product marketing for Liasion Technologies.

What challenge were you trying to address with Freshdesign?

We were working on implementing a new user flow for our current platform, but we didn’t have an in-house UX design team. We needed help from an outside vendor to design a new, end-to-end user flow that made customers feel engaged from the moment they visited the platform. Ultimately, we wanted to show our CEO a finalized design before we invested in the development process.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We started our engagement with Freshdesign with several creative discussions to think through the new user interface. They helped us identify challenges and come up with solutions. We prioritized user engagement in each element of the design. The final delivery was a prototype of the user flow for us to share with our CEO.

What is the team composition?

We only interacted with Raj (Founder & UX Strategist, Freshdesign), but there were a few others involved.

How did you come to work with Freshdesign?

A friend of mine had introduced me to Freshdesign years before we worked on this project. This was actually my fourth time working with Raj. Based on past experiences, I knew he’d be a good fit. It was a straight-forward project with a hard deadline, and I was confident in his team’s abilities.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent $110,000 on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked with Freshdesign from April–November 2018.

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

It was very important for us to clearly share our vision with our customers through our platform. We described our needs to Freshdesign, and they responded with good ideas. It was a very productive partnership, and the results speak to that. The prototype generated over $2 million in revenue. Additionally, we gained recognition from two analyst organizations, Forrester and Gartner. We were even included in a Forrester Wave for integration platforms as a service (iPaaS), which helped us further promote our product and message.

How did Freshdesign perform from a project management standpoint?

Raj was excellent. We established a series of rules at the start of the project and used InVision to share work and leave comments. For other management needs, we also used Slack, Trello, Asana, and Smartsheets. Overall, it was a very agile process.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’m most impressed by their client portfolio. The team has successfully worked with big names like Facebook and Google, and they’ve built a lot of experience. Anyone looking to improve their UI should partner with the Freshdesign team.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I can’t think of anything.

Any advice for potential customers?

Raj has a very simple approach to assembling teams for each project, which is very helpful for clients who don’t know what resources they’d like to work with. He considers any possible ambiguities in terms of both cost and quality.