Human

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and position.

I am the Senior Project Manager of Savio.agency

Describe what your company does in a single sentence.

eCommerce marketing services

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What specific goals or objectives did you hire Human to accomplish?

• Brand Awareness
• Social Media Following
• Revenue Growth

SOLUTION

How did you find Human?

Referral

Why did you select Human over others?

• Great culture fit
• Good value for cost
• Referred to me
• Company values aligned

What was the size of Human’s team?

15

Describe the scope of work in detail. Please include a summary of key deliverables.

An big email marketing agency sought the expertise of Human Agency to provide strategic branding services that would differentiate their two brands. Human Agency created brand identities, messaging, and collateral, which included designing logos and website.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

What were the measurable outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

• Brand Perception
• Website Traffic
• Employee Engagement

Describe their project management. Did they deliver items on time? How did they respond to your needs?

Our needs were given great attention by Aviad and his team, who exceeded our expectations by delivering more than what was agreed upon. Aviad's project management skills are highly commendable, and everything was consistently delivered on time throughout the project.

What was your primary form of communication with Human?

• Virtual Meeting
• Email or Messaging App

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

Human took the time to really understand our brand and target audience. The interviews they conducted with our customers were incredibly insightful and helped us identify key values and messages that we had been overlooking

Are there any areas for improvement or something Human could have done differently?

Regarding Human's work, I cannot come up with any improvement suggestions. The only thing I would have preferred is if they were available at an earlier hour, but I understand that this was not possible due to the difference in time zones.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

Hired as North America's Marketing Manager for CM.com. CM.com is a global cloud software provider of Business "Communication Platform as a Service" solutions "CPaaS" (like SMS, email, WhatsApp, etc).

Was hired to support the expansion of CM.com's brand presence and product offerings into the North American market. My role was growing the marketing team and growing our presence and acquisition via 360-degree marketing strategies and execution of paid, earned, owned, and shared media programs.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Human, and what were your goals?

CM.com's North American marketing team began as just me, in which localizing our website and content was the top priority. With that, Human took 100% ownership of defining our SEO strategy for website and content (e.g., blog, white papers) and the creation.

After seeing significantly positive results from their work, we expanded our engagement with them to include our paid media efforts, helping us restructure and improve our Google Ads campaigns and build out paid ads on new channels like LinkedIn and Facebook.l

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We looked for local marketing agencies that had multi-functional areas of expertise and had relevant industry knowledge. Out of approximately 10 different vendors, we selected Human because they were able to offer the most personalized data to support their ability to help us achieve our goals.

They also perfectly represented their brand...humans – as they were always accessible, open, flexible, and extremely diverse in their marketing expertise.

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and marking tools used.

We began providing Human with demos of our solution and a rundown of what our focus products were. We then showed them the internal tools that we used for our B2B marketing efforts, which Human was more than happy to adopt (despite our tools being a bit insufficient in typical B2B marketing automation tools). We REALLY appreciated their openness to doing this.

Not to mention, they used our tools and even helped us improve on them! Their deliverables included blog posts and website page development and optimizations.

We saw much better performance and value compared to the content developed by CM's other localizations. Human also helped us quickly establish top rankings for strategic search terms in our industry that made us highly visible among our competitors.

How many resources from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

We mainly worked with our account manager (amazing, detail-oriented, organized, and proactive) with the support of the Paid Ad lead (the most knowledgable paid ad marketer I've ever seen), content manager (delivered highly methodical work, that was very well researched, and delivered quickly).

We also had the opportunity to work with the COO and the CEO when needed which showed a lot of care that Human possessed/invested in their client success.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

We secured page 1 organic search engine rankings on over a dozen strategic keywords as well as two featured snippets. This was HUGE for our localization but also impressed CM.com's global organization as well.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

We had weekly project updates, monthly reporting reviews, and quarterly planning meetings. Each meeting had a purpose, value, and actionable insights. They're always prepared and exceeded expectations.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

They are not only full-service, but they are highly flexible to any sudden changes in our business objectives and easy to pivot and make strategic changes/updates to our projects that had been planned.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

No. They truly outperformed expectations.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

We are a cybersecurity company that helps organizations communicate more securely over email using the power of natural language understanding (NLU). 

As head of product marketing, I am responsible for the company's messaging and positioning, content marketing, demand generation messaging, website, AR-PR, and social media.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Human and what were your goals?

We hired Human Marketing to be an extension of our lean marketing team. We aimed for the Human team to be clued-in to all our existing marketing goals and activities, and provide strategic and tactical support on: website copy, design, and development; content/SEO; CRO and landing pages; email marketing.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor and what were the deciding factors?

We got to know about Human Marketing through a referral. We were impressed with the thought and detail they put into their proposal to grow our marketing impact. The referrals we connected with also spoke glowingly about Human's ways of working and consistent performance. 

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and marking tools used.

For the first two months, the main scope of the project was executing a website refresh ahead of an important announcement. Since then, Human Marketing clearly defines the scope for each month and has executed on a range of activities including nurture email flows, creating new landing pages from scratch, and creating and executing on a content calendar for SEO-critical topics.

How many resources from the vendor's team worked with you, and what were their positions?

The Human Team all have faces to them, which is much appreciated. We are in regular touch with the client success manager and marketing director. On a per-project basis, we also communicate with their content lead, CRO lead, head designer, and email marketing lead. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any measurable outcomes of the project or general feedback about the deliverables?

We will see measurable impacts from the project pretty soon. So far, most of the work put in has been subjective, so it's a testament to Human's work that there has been lots of positive feedback even if the numbers aren't there yet! We have got lots of positive feedback for the new website design, the email flows are more optimized now, and we are soon launching new demo landing pages with improved CRO.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

It took a few weeks for both teams to get used to each other's way of working and communication frequency. The Human team were open and honest throughout, clearly communicating what they could accomplish, what they couldn't, and giving their guidance if they thought a particular decision was sub-optimal.

What did you find most impressive or unique about this company?

The company is named perfectly, because they are a very human company. Their team has bags of talent and expertise, but they combine it with empathy and emotional intelligence that's tough to measure but makes all the difference when companies work with agencies.

Are there any areas for improvement or something they could have done differently?

No agency will be a 10/10, but that's largely down to technical product knowledge that only people at the company have, or continued refinements in matching to each other's wavelengths. Human hit the ground running and haven't let up on their speed or quality of impact. They always ask for feedback and aren't afraid to improve on their existing processes to match the expectations of their clients.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of a solar power company.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Human?

We had an issue with mobile devices because our website wasn’t mobile-friendly. We had a sigificant bounce rate because the website wasn’t good.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Human helped us redesign the website. Their team redesigned it from the ground up, making it mobile-friendly.

They’re helping us with SEM, SEO, and CRO initiatives. Their team targets keywords to drive traffic and convert sales. They help us identify which keywords drive sales, and then we optimize for them to get more traffic through organic search.

What is the team composition?

We work with about 4–5 different members of the team, including the CEO, an account strategist, the SEO director, and an account manager.

How did you come to work with Human?

I met the CEO through a business group. By attending meetings with him, I realized he was knowledgeable about digital marketing. That built trust and credibility.  

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent over $200,000 on their services so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started our ongoing partnership in March 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

After Human optimized our website, we turned more visitors into leads. On the money we've spent, we've made a total ROI. We’ve made more than we've invested.

They’re a business partner. Human is a results-oriented company. Their team measures their performance based on our performance.

How did Human perform from a project management standpoint?

Their team meets every deadline that's set. Their communication is great. As soon as we email them, we receive a response within a few hours. Even on Saturdays or Sundays, they’ll respond to any urgent emails.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They monitor the results to ensure we’re succeeding with their services.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They ask me this question every month. I haven’t seen any areas of improvement for them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Know what you want when you hire them. You also have to be patient. The improvements don’t happen overnight. It’s also important that you’re willing to invest in the project.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the chief communications officer for a nonprofit that mentors teen girls who may be living or going to school in under-resourced communities. We have approximately 30 employees and conduct programs in four markets nationwide.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

For what projects/services did your company hire Human Marketing?

We hired Human Marketing because we had decided to outsource digital marketing. As a nonprofit, we have a lean staff and we wanted to be sure we had robust expertise in the area of digital marketing and the ability to keep up with the trends. We needed an agency that could both execute our day-to-day needs, especially with social media and e-communications, but also guide us on strategy and analytics.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to grow our online community and increase engagement both online and among our membership.

SOLUTION

How did you select this vendor?

We formed a search committee that included board members with expertise in this industry. Our committee made a list of agencies to consider - some from research and some from personal connections and past experience. We conducted an initial round of outreach using an RFP and received three proposals. We interviewed the three agencies and then met a few additional times with our top selection, Human Marketing.

We selected Human Marketing because they had the capabilities to cover what we knew we needed, but their primary area of expertise seemed to be in an area that our nonprofit had never worked with before. We liked the idea that most of their clients were e-commerce clients and felt like they would bring a new perspective to our digital marketing efforts.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

We conducted thorough onboarding meetings where we shared brand guidelines and our hopes and goals for our partnerships. Our team at Human Marketing got to work on a plan for us. They would work a certain number of hours each month on executing our essential work, but then allot a certain number of hours toward strategic projects. This enabled us to keep up with the work but also excel in new ways thanks to their expert guidance.

What was the team composition?

From the beginning, I've been so grateful for the size of the team allotted to our account. Each team member brings a key expertise and area of responsibility. We have always had one leader who is responsible for our account management, and then 2 additional team members who work with us on day-to-day execution.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Can you share any outcomes from the project that demonstrate progress or success?

From the beginning, our work with Human Marketing has exceeded expectations. One strategic project that they recommended within our first 6 months of working together resulted in more than $25,000 in donations to the organization. Overall, our online community has exceeded growth expectations and our e-communications are exceeding performance goals.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Our Human Marketing team is responsive, thorough and helpful! They are constantly seeking ways to improve our workflow and teamwork. The team takes time to meet with us, both on a weekly basis, and with special quarterly reporting meetings and bi-annual in person meetings. The thoughtfulness goes a long way toward building our long-term partnership.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I was impressed at how quickly the team was able to adapt their e-commerce expertise to our nonprofit industry. Their sound recommendations made an immediate impact.

Are there any areas for improvement?

We are beyond satisfied with our partnership with Human Marketing!

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the president and COO of The Art of Coaching.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Human Marketing?

We actually had quite a few challenges. When I started working here about a year ago, I analyzed the business and realized that about 45% of our revenue was tied to subscriptions. However, we didn’t have a good lead generation and conversion ecosystem.

The second challenge was that our website didn’t effectively represent our products. So, I needed help with promoting our subscription business and improving the functionality of the website so that we could acquire new customers and convert them to paid subscribers.

We also had a deficiency in automated campaigns and workflows. We did have some campaigns but they weren’t reaching every person who visited our site.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

After carrying out an initial audit, Human Marketing presented us with recommendations and ideas of immediate and longterm opportunities. The bulk of their work to date has been developing a roadmap of the specific components of our business that we’ve been working on addressing.

They are also working on optimizing the workflows that we had in place and building additional ones. For the first 6–9 months, they primarily worked on e-mail workflows, along with leading marketing efforts and redesigning some of our website pages. 

Right now, they are working with us to develop a whole new website. The steps to get there include doing an audit of our current systems, understanding project requirements, and building the wireframes for the new site.

What is the team composition?

We have two primary points of contact but we work with four people in total, one of whom we brought on to manage the website development project. 

How did you come to work with Human Marketing?

I was researching local and regional agencies when I came across Human Marketing. I thought they would be a good fit because of the core competencies that they had listed on their website. They had also worked with an e-commerce company that I was familiar with so I reached out to them.

We reviewed five agencies and we picked them because they seemed flexible in terms of building a relationship based on our current needs while accommodating our longterm needs.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve invested $75,000 so far but we’ve negotiated an increased, monthly retainer for 2020.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement began in May 2019.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We don’t have a great point of reference because, historically, our organization didn’t have any analytics in place. But, from what we do know, the work done by Human Marketing has definitely led to an overall increase.

We’ve doubled the number of subscription trials from the previous year and we’ve seen an uptick in the number of paid subscriptions. Additionally, our revenue from subscriptions has also increased by around 21% since we started working with Human Marketing compared to the previous year. 

How did Human Marketing perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve performed very well and project management has been one of the strong points of our relationship. Human Marketing is a relatively small agency so we’ve been able to work with their senior managers who are very responsive. 

We’re a small company with a seasonal, countrywide business so there are times when we’ve let things slip through the cracks. But, Human Marketing has helped us stick to deadlines and keep the projects on track.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re a very capable team which, in addition to their skills and expertise, has made this relationship work well. Their approach and their attentiveness have also been impressive. They bring a much more extensive capacity than we have in-house.

During the first 3–4 months when we were going through the process of identifying opportunities, the team was very adept, listening to our needs at the time and coming up with a well-thought-out plan of implementation. They’ve been very collaborative, which is why we continue to engage with them.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don't have any suggestions. We did a pretty good job of assessing our needs right from the beginning and had them work on the elements that fit their skill set.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Identify who is going to be working on your account. We had a good idea of where we could gain traction quickly and the team was very responsive so, I would advise other companies to conduct a concise analysis of their needs and evaluate the recommendations that Human Marketing gives them. When you have a clear plan of action, it will help you with the execution and the setting of parameters for the engagement.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the co-founder of a company called SugarShot.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Human Marketing?

I hired Human Marketing to help us increase the value of our spend with Google through PPC and SEO efforts.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

For the SEO side of things, their team analyzes the copy on our website to figure out how well our keywords align with our needs. Their keyword analysis unearths the right choices we should make to appeal to our targets. They work on our blogging efforts, ensuring we’re posting the right content, writing it for us, and backlinking to our site. 

What is the team composition?

I work with Joel (Founder & Lead SEO Expert). 

How did you come to work with Human Marketing?

I followed a referral from a contact of mine. 

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent around $150,000. 

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in January 2016 and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I’ve noticed an increase in our client-base by 10%.

How did Human Marketing perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve been great at managing the project. Whenever we have issues with billing or performance, they’re quick to correct the problem and communicate with us. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

They truly care about the businesses they work with and make sure the project is done correctly. If expectations aren’t met, they’re great at explaining the reasons behind their process so we understand everything. They really care about their clients in all these ways. They’re very capable and I enjoy working with Joel. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, I don’t have any suggestions. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Go into the project with as much clarity about your needs as you can. Make sure you’re aligned on what you’re looking for so everyone is on the same page about what a win looks like. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the President and founder of Thompson Tee Inc. We designed, invented, and patented a special undershirt that blocks underarm sweat for men and women. We sell through our website, Amazon, as well as several small international distributors.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Human Marketing?

Neither my partner nor I had any direct e-commerce experience, so we engaged Human Marketing to handle all of our digital marketing.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They handle both marketing and technical aspects of our site. They run our on-site SEO, which involves content creation for all of our blogs, in addition to our off-page marketing like email and PPC campaigns, backlinking, and online adds. On the technical side, they helped get our site up and running, and now they monitor our KPI’s like bounce rate and load time. Finally, they’re in control of our social media presence and determine all that content, as well as post frequency.

What is the team composition?

We have a project manage, but we also speak with the founder, along with two other people.

How did you come to work with Human Marketing?

We reached out after they were recommended to us by someone at a business consulting agency. That third party connected us with Human Marketing’s founder. They started doing some basic work for us like installing Google Analytics, and then we tiptoed into the relationship we have now.

How much have you invested with them?

We’ve spent between $200,000 – $1 million.

What is the status of this engagement?

We’ve been working together since April 2015.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We've always made more money than we spent with them, so for every dollar we put in, we're getting about four dollars back. We’ve also been able to take over the number one organic search spot for a lot of things that we’re competing against big consumer brands for. Also, we’ve been mentioned in leading men’s health and life magazines.

How did Human Marketing perform from a project management standpoint?

They do so much for us, and they’ve been doing it for so long, that we view them as a business partner of ours. We have a monthly review and then a quarterly review, which is much more in depth. We obviously communicate on an as-needed basis, which, I would imagine, is every other day. It really feels like they're our in-house marketing department.

What did you find most impressive about them?

What we didn't like about other digital marketing firms is that they kind of lumped a bunch of services into this monthly retainer, and you come to find out that a lot of that is very basic stuff. I understand that model, but with Joel and his group, you understand exactly what you’re paying for, and you know that your money is having an effect, that it’s producing results.

One thing that stood out was the content they're able to create and put out there. It's really helped us become an authoritative figure in the space. They also have a very ROI-driven culture, which is what we like. They're one of our most important business partners at this point.

Are there any areas they could improve?

They’re a growing company, and no company is going to be perfect, but as far as distinct areas needing improvement, I can't think of any. Obviously, they have growing pains that every company has, but they address those and get over them as needed. Any issues we've had are well within the tolerable range for our relationship.

Any advice for potential customers?

I would say just engage them and they'll take it from there.