Ignite Digital

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a marketing manager for a materials manufacturer.

What challenge were you trying to address with Ignite Digital?

My company hired them for digital marketing services.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Ignite managed our SEO and PPC campaigns. They created and placed ads as well as targeted segments and industries to generate conversions. Ignite also assisted with web design and web development services as well.

What is the team composition?

Over the course of the engagement years, I worked with three people from Ignite. I worked with two account managers and another person worked on any website updates or development issues.

How did you come to work with Ignite Digital?

When I started with the company, I inherited the partnership with Ignite.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost changed throughout the four years of our engagement. We actually increased the budget at one point, hoping to see better results. Last year, we spent over $100,000 on the engagement.

What is the status of this engagement?

We are no longer working with Ignite Digital.

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

Although Ignite understood digital marketing, I didn’t see improvements in our website's traffic or leads. They touted a special algorithm, but I learned that we spent money on wasted impressions. They focused on segments, industries, and ads that didn’t convert. Their team didn’t come to the table with suggestions for improvements and limited us on focus keywords for SEO initiatives.

How did Ignite Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

As I didn’t frequently hear from them, I often had to chase them. Their response time was slow. I also had to repeat myself, so it felt that they didn’t read my emails. If they monitored the account more, their team may have been able to catch wasted impressions. We could've saved money on placements, segments, and ads that didn’t convert.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Ignite was friendly but their performance plateaued. Their team was sunny, upbeat, and positive when I was able to reach them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

It was a struggle working with Ignite.

Please describe your company and your position there.

We are an E-Commerce apparel company with a focus on engineering garments free from gender-based limits. Our clothes are meant for humans and not anyone in specific. That is what truly makes us special. I am the Founder and Creative Lead.

For what projects/services did your company hire Ignite Digital?

We hired Ignite Digital for PPC on Google AdWords and SEO as we were currently not ranking for any keywords at the time.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goals were to increase our organic presence on Google, it wasn't hard to see that although we were getting sales through social media and our Ad campaigns, SEO was the last missing step in our process.

How did you select Ignite Digital?

We were recommended Ignite Digital by a former colleague of mine who also has his own apparel company, they have been with Ignite Digital for quite some time now and recommended them to us.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

Ignite Digital was in charge of my SEO, making sure the keywords I had selected were ranking and also PPC, which is a service I added about 4 months in after parting ways with my former agency.

What was the team composition?

At the sales process, I was in contact with one of their sales representatives, and from there I was given an account manager who became my main point of contact.

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

Since working with Ignite Digital, my online presence (which was non-existent before) skyrocketed! I now see the majority of my store traffic coming through Google, which was not the case before as the majority of my visitors used to come from social media (Facebook primarily)

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Ignite Digital provided constant communication, fast reply times, and more importantly if something was wrong or I was unsure of how to something on Shopify, I had the comfort of picking up the phone and calling them.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Their support material and tutorials are so amazing that you can fix your issues by following the step by them. Even Ignite Digital’s email resources have been so good that I now refer to them anytime I come across any issues with my website’s search engine optimization (SEO) or my PPC account.

Even If I stumble upon some complex issue that I cannot solve while referring to their resource material, I know where to get my support. Their customer service is super amazing. Every person on their team is super smart, more importantly, I genuinely feel they really want to support their clients. Five out of Five stars to them!

Are there any areas for improvement?

At this time, I have no suggestions for Ignite Digital other than to continue what they're doing and keeping up the great customer service.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am the owner of https://veilad.co we sell UVC Sanitizing products

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

My company hired Ignite Digital in August of 2020. We were very excited to work with what LOOKED to be a great company. We agreed to a 1 year contract for link building and SEO. I asked them to send me a list of the backlinks they posted every month and they agreed.

How did you select Ignite Digital and what were the deciding factors?

I reviewed many company's and went with them because they sounded professional. Good on them i was fooled

Describe the scope of work in detail, including the project steps, key deliverables, and campaigns.

They were hired to do link building and seo and did not do it

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

2

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

I asked them to send me a list of the backlinks they posted every month and they agreed. September was our first full service month and they sent us a list of 4 back links.

We thought that given the silly amount of money we were paying this was a small amount but they assured us they knew what they were doing and things would pick up. After 6 months of work, our domain authority had only gone up 2 points and we got suspicious. I then asked Ignite Digital for a full list of backlinks they had created.

I got nothing from them for almost a week. At this point I setup an SEMRush account and did a full scan of our site only to find that only 3 of the backlinks we had came from Ignite Digital. I then confronted Ignite Digital and they provided a list of 16 backlinks they had supposedly setup over the life of our contract.

When I went and checked these back links all but 3 of them had been created in the last week since I had asked them for the full list (I have screen shots of all of them). I then went back to Ignite Digital and demanded a refund because after paying them almost 10k they obviously had not fulfilled their end of the contract.

Their response was "Ignite Digital has never and will not give a refund. But if you pay us for this month we will let you out of the contract". To sum it up. Do not ever go into business with this company and if you do.

Don't make the same mistake I did, verify everything they claim they did. P.S. I have proof to backup all my claims and will happily provide it.

Describe their project management style, including communication tools and timelines.

hands on

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

How well they got me to believe they were a good company while doing nothing

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

Don't breach your contracts

Please describe your company and your position there.

I manage an e-commerce store that sells healthy foods to restaurants and offices. I’m responsible for all marketing and sales activities.

For what projects/services did your company hire Ignite Digital?

We needed help with SEO to boost our online presence.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to increase sales by creating a recognizable brand name for the company.

How did you select this vendor?

We met representatives from Ignite Digital at a fundraiser and decided to try them out.

Describe the project in detail.

Ignite Digital introduced our brand and products to new markets, such as corporate offices. They also manage our SEO and social media accounts.

What was the team composition?

I work with an account manager.

Can you share any statistics or metrics that speak to the quality of their work and impact of the engagement?

Our company has grown in size considerably since we began working with Ignite Digital. We’ve been able to expand our products into several workspaces thanks to our increased online presence.

How did the Ignite Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

Their team is on top of everything, requiring no follow-up on our part. We meet on a monthly basis with our account manager to go over keyword rankings and social media KPIs.

What impresses you about the Ignite Digital?

Their quality of work and attention to detail caters to exactly what my company needs.

Are there any areas for improvement?

We have no complaints, and look forward to continuing to work with their team. I’m always happy to rave about Ignite Digital.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I manage customer service, office administration, and marketing for an online alumni program.

What challenge were you trying to address with Ignite Digital?

We wanted to partner with an SEO and PPC specialist to generate more site traffic and increase our visibility amongst the target audience.

What was the scope of their involvement?

Ignite Digital launched a PPC campaign to help us boost our traffic and brand visibility. They also helped us integrate SEO best practices into our web content to improve our rank within the major search engines.

What is the team composition?

The account manager was our main point of contact, but we also worked with the project manager on occasion.

How did you come to work with Ignite Digital?

We came across Ignite Digital while searching for reputable digital marketing professionals online. In addition to having the best response rate, they had the most professional customer service efforts compared to the other firms that we interviewed.

What is the status of this engagement?

Our partnership began in February 2017.

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

The number of people signing up for our events has doubled since Ignite Digital initiated the PPC campaign. Their SEO efforts have proven to be equally successful, with our company appearing on the first page for all relevant keywords and phrases. 

How did Ignite Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

At the beginning of the project, we were in contact almost every day to map out the project. Once the scope was finalized, we convened each week to review their progress and make edits as needed. Their efficient team has proven to be excellent partners. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

Ignite Digital provides the most effective marketing services for online growth. With their help, we have achieved all of our business goals.

Are there any areas they could improve?

We hope that Ignite Digital takes a proactive approach to manage our rapidly growing audience.

Please describe your organization.

We're an online custom dress shirt maker based out of Chicago.

What is your position?

I'm the owner and founder.

What business challenge were you trying to address with Ignite Digital?

We had a rudimentary SEO [search engine optimization] strategy that had been done to date. We were losing momentum and losing rank. We approached Ignite, and they did an analysis of our site and realized that we were delving into gray hat SEO. Their methodology is much more white hat in that they provide pure content that gets picked up by Google. In the long run, it helps build rank for keywords that we're after.

Please describe the scope of their involvement in detail.

In addition to the SEO work, they're also helping on our pay-per-click campaigns. They're helping us use more strategic mechanisms to figure out how we target the right demographic for keyword searches like "custom dress shirts" or "tailored dress shirts." Those words get very expensive, so we're trying to figure out ways to pinpoint the exact consumer at the exact time of day, the exact day of the week, based on more analytics that we have from both our site and from order history. They've been helping with that, and it's proving somewhat successful, although it's still early.

How did you come to work with Ignite Digital?

Matt [Goulart, founder at Ignite Digital] was a customer of ours, so we were chatting about shirts, and he was telling me a little bit about what he did. I was interacting with a customer, and he started telling me about his business, so we both needed one another, I guess.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started in the latter part of 2013, and we are still working together.

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

It's really around sales, organic traffic, and rank. In all of those three areas, we've seen a sizable uptick since we started working with Ignite Digital. It's multipronged in terms of the success criteria that we've set forth. In rank, for terms like "custom dress shirts," we're now ranking at the bottom of the first page, top of the second page, among guys that have $10,000 to $15,000 a month marketing budgets. We're a fraction of that, and we're still able to make inroads there. That is generating leads, which is leading to sales. We're seeing some success on the pay per click as well. On all fronts, there's a noticeable improvement since we started.

How did Ignite Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

I can get Matt on the phone at any time. It's never a problem, and we do monthly check ins. He provides a report as to where we were a month ago versus today, and we spend about 20 to 30 minutes going through it. There's a good one-on-one rapport there. The communication has always been good.

What distinguishes Ignite Digital from other providers?

They are very flexible. The pay-per-click stuff was a little out of their wheelhouse, in that it's not in our scope of work. Matt still took it on and is doing it essentially pro bono until it's successful, which is nice. That's not the case with most of these guys. There's a lot of charlatans in this industry, but Matt genuinely seems to want to see his customers succeed. You can see that and feel that when you talk with him.

I've asked him if we could do something bigger in certain areas, and he could bill the heck out of me if he wanted to, but he's said, "Well, I don't know that that's going to lead to anything because you're still swimming against the tide." He's pragmatic and honest with what direction he feels is going to provide the most value, so that's nice. The SEO industry is full of many guys that are just not trustworthy, and I've been burned quite a few times, which is why it's good to have him on the team.

Is there anything Ignite Digital could have improved or done differently?

They may want to bring in some additional subject matter expertise in other areas. Pay per click is not something that they regularly do for their clients. That's an expensive endeavor, and they're treating what we're doing together as a pilot. I guess if they wanted to branch off into another vertical, I think it's a logical extension in doing a lot of the pay-per-click analysis.

It would be beneficial for them to have more access to software that allows them to give us more targeted analytics around where we should be spending those dollars. Right now, we're shotgunning it, trying a few different things and seeing what hits. On the SEO side, they're very good. I think if they try to get into some other areas, they may want to elicit additional subject matter expertise or purchase licenses for some of the software tools that their competitors use.

Please describe your organization.

We are a staffing agency for marketing and creative individuals at senior levels, similar to head hunters.  We work for clients, so whatever roles that they have open, they can hire us to fill them with our talent because we have a very big database of marketers and creative people on board. 

What is your position?

I am the director of the company. I do everything from reception to accounting and payroll.  I help with sales, marketing and I also do some recruiting. 

What business challenge were you trying to address with Ignite Digital?

We were falling below on organic and paid search with Google, so we asked Ignite if they could help us. They came in and took over Google analytics and told us what we needed to change on the backend of our website, because if your website isn’t up to par Google can’t rank you and you’ll fall below.

Please describe the scope of their involvement in greater detail.

They did a lot of backend work with our website will probably be helping with redesigning our website in the near future.

How did you come to work with Ignite Digital?

My boss received an email from them regarding Search Engine Optimization [SEO] and she asked me to get in contact with them. 

What is the status of this engagement?

The project started this summer [2015], and the work is ongoing.

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

We rank higher in organic search.  They have fixed up a lot of backend errors on our website.  Their work has been great.  We were a mess before and they came and fixed everything.  They’re very much on the ball, and they provide feedback right away.  They even have given us unpaid advice.

How did Ignite Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

Their project management approach was perfect.  Ten stars.

What distinguishes Ignite Digital from other providers?

I have to applaud Matt.  I’m under the impression that he’s the president of Ignite, and he’s doing a wonderful job.  He breaks down all the technical terms I’m unfamiliar with. He takes the time to go over everything with me so I understand. Most people can’t give you exact dates and results, but Ignite will tell you exactly how much it’s going to cost and what we need to get there in a way that makes sense to you.  

Is there anything Ignite Digital could have improved or done differently?

They could improve their pricing. It seems expensive at times. 

Please describe your organization.

I work for IPS – Invoice Payment System Corporation. We are a finance company in Toronto. We finance current receivables and invoice receivables.

What is your position?

I am the marketing director. I handle the branding, the advertising, the events, and anything to do with our brand outside of this office.

What business challenge were you trying to address with Ignite Digital?

Our industry, specifically in Canada, has a bit of a negative stigma. We were being approached by companies that were at their last strand. We weren't being able to reach companies that were thriving, but needed cash flow. In the last year or two years, I've been trying to hit as many marketing channels and SEO [search engine optimization] was one of them. That's when I got hold of Ignite.

Please describe the scope of their involvement in detail.

They developed our SEO strategy and have worked on web development. They're also doing some design.

How did you come to work with Ignite Digital?

It was through a Google search. After that, I actually had his company papers on my desk, but I didn't make the connection that that's what Ignite Digital did.

What is the status of this engagement?

We've been working with them for a year. It's ongoing. They handle our SEO and are building our new website.

Could you share any statistics or metrics from this engagement?

Every month, they run a report and we do our own report as well to make sure they match with Google Analytics and what our ROI [return on investment] is. It's been working. Before they came into play, we were probably third or fourth on Google pages and now 10 out of our 20 words we've given them are in the top 10. We're on first page. Now, I can actually see that some of our leads are coming from Google. I'm happy with that. They are there to help you and explain everything. They're accommodating and stay as long as they need to in order to get the job done. Customer service has been fantastic.

How did Ignite Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

They knew what our budget was when it came to SEO. They kept to that. We haven't gone over budget without website.  He made it feasible with his pricing so we were able to consider doing the website. He hasn't missed a deadline since we started.

What distinguishes Ignite Digital from other providers?

Ignite Digital's knowledge is impressive. I met with quite a few other SEO and marketing firms before this, and I've dealt a lot with them and this was the first one that was able to give me the reason behind every suggestion they had and then follow through. Matt [Goulart, founder of Ignite Digital] is the reason why we stuck around because of his knowledge.

Is there anything Ignite Digital could have improved or done differently?

Have more of Matt because I'm sure they're going to get bigger.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the founder and creative director of a clothing company, we primarily sell our offerings online, with seasonal brick & mortar pop-ups.

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

As we prepared for the holiday rush, we decided that we needed a larger presence on Google, we felt we were too reliant on our social media ads and needed to diversify.

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

We searched online, looking for a digital marketing company that was within 30-70 km of our offices. After cutting down the field to our top 3, Ignite Digital won us over with their transparency during the sales process, they didn't make any outrageous/unrealistic promises that we noticed a lot of the other companies constantly did.

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

After the sales process, we got right into it and made sure that my foundation was set up for success. We identified any major problems & areas of concern on my website and made the necessary changes. On a monthly basis we meet to discuss our results in-depth, this allows me to look back on overall performance and see what adjustments/tweaks need to be made.

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

I worked with one salesperson, from there I have had my account manager Matthew ever since I've signed on.

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

Our presence on search engines, mainly Google went from being non-existent to now, being competitive and within the top 10. The process of SEO isn't overnight, and they do a great job of communicating that to me.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The workflow was effective, like I mentioned, we had monthly meetings to discuss a report. In terms of me communicating with them, I always felt as if they met my needs with genuine feedback/help.

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

Customer service is great, every single person I've had an encounter with at Ignite has met me with professionalism and respect. No matter the size of your business, they always treat you like you're a part of their team. That's what continues to impress me, even after 2 years.

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

As of right now no, I can truly say that they've grown with us over the span of our partnership.

Please describe your company and your position there.

Peter Smith GM is an authorized dealer for sales and service of GM vehicles. We are located in Belleville, Ontario, Canada and I currently work as a marketing specialist.

For what projects/services did your company hire Ignite Digital?

Ignite Digital was hired on solely for SEO purposes. More importantly, we needed an agency that followed through on its promises and had a clear schedule/plan moving forward.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goals were to increase our organic searches and get ranking on Google. As a company, we are aware of the importance that SEO has for longevity and reputation. Especially in these times, having a presence on Google is as important as it’s ever been.

How did you select Ignite Digital?

We found Ignite Digital through a friend, who recommended them to us.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

They made sure my site content was up to speed with Google’s standards and kept me in the loop every month regarding my keyword rankings and positional changes.

What was the team composition?

After completing the sales process with Marty, I was assigned my account manager Megan and she has been my main point of contact since.

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

We know SEO takes time but throughout our partnership, we have seen a steady increase in our Google rankings and organic traffic, with their help we also managed to make it into the Google Local Pack, which I previously never knew about.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The work with them was efficient and simple! No unnecessary meetings or video calls, they mean business and got me the information I needed consistently and effectively. In addition, they adapt to my early morning schedule which is a bonus!

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They are responsive and genuinely care about the success of their clients, I have wholeheartedly learned that since joining forces with them.

Are there any areas for improvement?

No complaints about Ignite Digital. Keep up the great work.