Major Tom

Please describe your company and your position there.

Montigo is a North American residential and commercial fireplace manufacturer with locations in Langley BC and Ferndale WA. My role is Marketing Manager. I have been with the company 3 years.

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

Initially, website design, development, and SEO. Once the first phase of the website redesign was complete, Major Tom has provided ongoing support through monthly monitoring and a few smaller projects to improve site function.

What were your goals for this project?

We needed a website that would allow us to serve our B2B customers and also provide a secure support library for them, and also appeal to consumer, architects and designers.

How did you select this vendor?

I was not involved in that process, I was hired after the contracts were already signed. That said, I strongly believe that the people involved in the decision chose our vendor very well.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

We started with developing a sitemap to create the architecture of the site. Once the sitemap was approved they moved on to wireframes and worked with us to make sure the site was going to work for each of our audiences and provide the best user experience possible. After wireframes they worked on the overall design of the site.

Once we had the full workflow and design approved, development began and we were able to review periodically throughout the process to make sure we were on track. Testing was very thorough and performed at multiple steps during development. After development, we worked closely with MT to edit and update our content to current SEO standards.

What was the team composition?

I have had one main contact throughout our relationship, Ben Van Exan, who has been an incredible support. Other members of the team would come and go as required, but we always work with the same core designers and developers.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Our old website, which was about 10 years old, had been experiencing a 10-20% decline in traffic each year over a period of 4-5 years. The effect the new site had on traffic was immediate and dramatic.

Overall, our first year with the new site saw a 36% increase in traffic and more than 400 user account requests from our dealers. Three years later, traffic is still increasing every month and we have 650+ user accounts. We also get a lot of positive feedback from our dealers and consumers alike.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Project management was extremely effective. I was key contact for my company, and I only communicated directly with my account manager except during review presentations and collaborative meetings. This allowed us to streamline each step of the process and keep communication fast and efficient.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Efficient communication and responsiveness are Major Tom's superpowers. I am never left hanging without answers. Issues are detected and addressed quickly. Email and calls are always answered within the hour (usually within a few minutes), which is greatly appreciated.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I have no suggestions for improvement. I am 100% happy with the service we receive, and am very happy to moving into yet another project with Major Tom. I know our needs will be met or exceeded.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I work for a home builder who builds single family and multi-family homes in Calgary, Edmonton and Texas. I am the graphic designer for the multi-family division.

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

We worked together to build the main website for our multi-family division. They took our vision and developed the website in WordPress so that we can maintain the website in house.

What were your goals for this project?

Goals were to attract customers and give them all the information they need about our products.

How did you select this vendor?

We have been using them since before I joined the company. They were recommended by my manger at the time and have worked with them since.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

They helped develop and launch our websites. They created the website in WordPress so that we have the ability to maintain the website. If there are any issues we cannot do ourselves, we are in easy contact with them to get things fixed and or added. They also help with SEO.

What was the team composition?

Depending on the project, there were about 3-5 people working on the project. There is usually 1-2 project managers that would help delegate the tasks.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Sometimes we have short deadlines, they are always accommodating and get the work done on time or sometimes even quicker.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Project management was always great. They get the work done and on time. They had set me up with a communication/project management site (DoneDone) to keep me up to date with all projects and issues.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They are always great to work with, we communicated easily and they always understood our end goal.

Are there any areas for improvement?

I can not think of any improvement at the moment.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the VP of marketing for a restaurant chain.

What challenge were you trying to address with Major Tom?

We’ve worked with Major Tom on all our digital initiatives over the last 4–5 years. We’re an operation-heavy business that operates restaurants and serves guests in our stores.  At the time, understanding and being present in the online space was our main challenge.

We needed to build a strategy around engaging our guests online, mainly through social media. When I joined two years ago, bandwidth and resourcing were the biggest obstacles as the online space continued to grow. 

What was the scope of their involvement?

When I started with the company, I took over the overall social and digital strategy. Major Tom serves as our arms, legs, and ears in the digital space. They help us track ads, run campaigns, and execute on our strategies.

Major Tom supports our social media strategy, website presence, and PPC advertising. Beyond that, they used SEO techniques to make sure our site was tagged properly for its major priority areas. They troubleshot errors or issues to keep our site listed properly in searches. 

Along with writing good copy and helping us create great content, they focus the majority of their efforts on our metadata. Major Tom identified and fixed crawl and indexing errors. They’ve helped us ensure we had best practices in place internally. After kicking off with an initial audit, they’ve helped us bring those efforts back in-house so we can manage them independently.
 
What is the team composition? 

I’ve mainly been in touch with our main account rep who acts as the project manager. I can contact them about any of our work, from SEO to social or paid media. 

Our secondary rep provides tactical execution. He takes part in all our calls and relays all the details to our team.
 
How did you come to work with Major Tom?

I don’t know how they were chosen because I wasn’t here at the time we initiated our partnership. They have a good reputation in Vancouver, and I’ve used their services at two companies I’ve worked for previously. I’m sure they were found by word of mouth.
 
What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with Major Tom around 2014. Our collaboration is ongoing.

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

Major Tom came up with paid strategies for promotional campaigns like gift cards, which have increased sales annually. The team contributed significantly to that success by getting the word out.

They support us with all our hiring ads as well. While I don’t have specific metrics for this, many of the candidates that show up at fairs mention seeing our ads online. We’re reaching the right number and type of people with Major Tom’s campaigns.
 
How did Major Tom perform from a project management standpoint?

We’ve had two teams switch over, but the consistency of project management has been very reliable. Brief templates they provide help us properly convey our needs to their team. They’re also very good at requesting the materials they need to get their job done.

Along with monthly meetups, we hold weekly calls over Zoom. I’m the main contact person on our end, and I use Slack and email to convey our requirements.
 
What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re a genuine group of people that are relatable, approachable, and genuinely interested in our business. The majority of the time, it feels more like a partnership than a transaction.

Whenever I work with Major Tom, I know they’ll give us their best service and provide everything we need for the right business reasons. I never feel like I’m troubling them, or something’s too much to ask. The process has never felt robotic.
 
Are there any areas they could improve?

As our reactive business changes and evolves, we’ve struggled with resourcing in the competitive restaurant industry. I wish they could have more people on standby for when I need requests finished quickly, but those periods only tend to last a short amount of time before things go back to normal. 

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I'm the digital marketing specialist at Seneca College, a postsecondary institution in Ontario, Canada. My job is to coordinate paid campaigns to drive domestic enrollment.

What challenge were you trying to address with Major Tom?

We hired Major Tom to co-manage our campaigns and expand them so that we could reach the student audience more effectively.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We task Major Tom with managing and optimizing our digital marketing campaigns across paid platforms such as Google Ads, Facebook, and Instagram. In conjunction with that goal, they are responsible for web and landing page development, running social campaigns, and writing copy to make the most of our budget and drive enrollment toward a performance goal established by the college.

What is the team composition?

We mainly keep in touch with our account manager.

How did you come to work with Major Tom?

They participated in an RFP several years ago. They proved to have the most experience in a competitive environment, which has won them a contract that we've renewed each year since.

How much have you invested with them?

We spend about $50,000–$100,000 CAD per year ($37,000–$75,000 USD).

What is the status of this engagement?

Our engagement began in 2014 and remains ongoing.

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

Their work is making our performance more efficient. When they took over the campaigns, they made significant improvements in the quality and success of our PPC marketing efforts.

How did Major Tom perform from a project management standpoint?

They’ve become more responsive to our feedback with each passing year. We started with good communication, but now we feel it’s as good as we can ask for.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I can’t imagine that we are one of their larger clients, but they treat us very well and are very attentive. We don’t feel like we’re part of their mix of clients—we’re made to feel like a priority.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I think we could benefit from more data courtesy of Facebook or Google’s users, but that data is either not available or requires a shift in that industry. It’s not necessarily something that Major Tom could improve.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Projects will be more successful if there are clear objectives and expectations.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am one of the Senior Directors at Arts Umbrella (in Vancouver, BC) and oversee both the Marketing and Communication needs for the organization. We are a not-for-profit arts education centre for young people aged 2-22.

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

Strategic guidance/partnership, Google Search, Google Ad copy, Google My Business and SEO management.

What were your goals for this project?

Our organization needed help from experts in the field. Without these capabilities in house, we needed to find a company that we trusted and one that would be pro-active on our behalf. Our goal was to partner/collaborate with a company that was going to have our best interests front and centre.

How did you select Major Tom?

My team picked Major Tom because they were a one stop shop. We required their expertise within the complex digital arena, but knowing that they were also well versed in marketing and branding, meant that we were going to get a holistic view of what was best for our organization.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

Our team at Major Tom ensured that we were visible in the marketplace.

What was the team composition?

We always had an Account Manager that was our main liaison. It changed once or twice, but it happened seamlessly, behind the scenes. Our most recent Manager was always on top of timelines, budgets and would frequently check-in with us to see what more that they could do.

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

Major Tom was able to provide guidance on an on-going basis for us. Without these capabilities in house, being able to rely on them was a god sent for us.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The team at Major Tom is collaborative and the experience between us and them was always a positive one.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Left brain and right brain! Always a privilege to work with a company that exudes logic and magic! Strategies were guaranteed to be steeped in creative and innovative ideas.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Nothing comes to the top of my mind!

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the Digital Media & Graphics manager of a global HVAC systems manufacturing organization.

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

We needed to help get into search engine results after a website redesign and were looking for an agency to manage ppc ads and help with our SEO efforts.

How did you select Major Tom and what were the deciding factors?

We had numerous meetings and attended an event they held which showcased their expertise with Google ads. They really stood out from the rest of the agencies we reviewed at the time.

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

Major Tom came up with the strategy for our ppc efforts. They guided us through the process and best practices to get us up and running extremely efficiently. They have continued to manage our digital ads and are optimizing them regularly to improve the performance and ROI.

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

The team ranged from 2-4 from time to time and consisted of Account reps, marketing experts, and SEO experts.

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

Our website is now ranking on Google for numerous keywords. Our ad campaigns currently in market have been optimized to a point where the costs drop month over month. We started with conversion costs close to $100 per conversion and currently, we are achieving costs of less than $10 per conversion.

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

Project management has been fantastic with monthly review meetings about the progress and results of the campaigns. As well as updates on the optimization efforts.

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

They were always very professional and friendly. The level of knowledge and experience with the different digital marketing options available is outstanding.

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

More granular breakdown of the hours spent on the account would help the larger team understand the value and effort that Major Tom brings to the table.

Please describe your company and your position there.

TransLink, Digital Marketing Specialist

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

Digital ad buy campaigns

What were your goals for this project?

Typically to drive people to our website to increase awareness about a project and/or solicit feedback through a survey

How did you select Major Tom?

Selection was done before my time. But for a specific project we'll often reach out and ask for a basic strategy for a campaign. If it meets our goals we'll move forward from there.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

Starts with strategy all the way to a final report. The start lays out where and what we'll be advertising on and puts some estimated results to each channel. From there we move into more detailed recommendations that help direct our key messages.

Once the campaign is live we receive a regular report at the mid point with recommendation. On completion, a detailed final report is sent to conclude the project. Throughout it all their team is always available for questions and information.

What was the team composition?

Multiple experts in each of their fields. Usually we have a single point person who manages the day-to-day conversation.

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

Metrics are more often than not on point. This helps us judge how successful a campaign was. Since they reliably hit their targets it makes it easier to run campaigns as we can be confident we'd get xyz results.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Very effective. Emails never go unanswered and we rarely have to follow up on a question. Deadlines are always met.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Expertise never fails to impress. Any question from the obvious to obscure is answered in an easy-to-understand manner.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Nothing major.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I work in digital marketing on a regional level within a large luxury hotel chain.

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

This was a search/display ad campaign. 6 of our hotels partnered with local attractions/operators to create a destination marketing hub and offer room packages for different Pacific Northwest experiences.

What were your goals for this project?

Impressions, clickthrough, website visits - mainly to a US audience.

How did you select this vendor?

We have worked with Major Tom on a number of search and display advertising campaigns. Abdulah, Tina and team do a great job of listening to what we're trying to accomplish, who our demographic is and then creating a campaign around it using their expertise. We always receive timely updates, prompt answers to any questions. These are never "set it and forget it" campaigns - they are always checking in and optimizing as we go along.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

Creating customer profiles, setting up our search and display campaigns based on our project outline.

What was the team composition?

Worked with our principle Account Manager, Abdullah Al-Ghoul, but also had some contact with his manger and Major Tom's VP as well. Great team to work with.

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

All of our benchmark goals were either met or exceeded. Far more ad impressions than we had hoped for.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

Lots of communication, easy to work with. Abdullah was always super quick to reply to email, requests, etc. Always a pleasure.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I am always impressed by how knowledgeable this team is. They always know about the latest in digital marketing, particularly what is going on with Google, etc. And they are always happy to share those learnings.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Major Tom is a little on the pricey side - but you get what you pay for. They certainly can deliver the results that they say they can.

Please describe your company and your position there.

We are a real estate developer with in-house marketing and sales teams. We are a local developer with over 30 years of building experience in Vancouver, Victoria, Toronto, and Los Angeles.

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

We hired Major Tom to manage all of our digital advertising and corporate social media channels.

What were your goals for this project?

Our goals were to increase exposure for the communities we were currently selling, build up our follower base on social media, and increase engagement across all platforms.

How did you select this vendor?

I have worked with Major Tom before, but had not engaged them in a few years. I had heard good things about what they had been up to since we last worked together, and wanted to give them another try.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

Major Tom manages all of our digital ads. This means they create all of the copy for our Google ads. As well, they select the media buy based on our target audience, and work with our digital ad design partners to advise on ads they think will resonate the most. They also manage and create all of our social media content. That means creating a content calendar and managing it on a daily basis.

What was the team composition?

I work closely with the principles of the firm, as well as with various project managers and project coordinators.

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

We have been able to increase our follower base on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook over the durations of the campaign. Engagement is up across all of our social media channels. We are receiving impressive registrations through our online campaigns, and they are increasing every day.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The project managers communicate very well and are extremely easy to work with.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I am really impressed by their knowledge and their ability to manage multiple projects at once.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Nothing notable.

Please describe your company and your position there.

The West Coast Fishing Club, Marketing Manager

For what projects/services did your company hire Major Tom?

Digital advertising and web development and maintenance

What were your goals for this project?

We built a new website with Major Tom about 5-6 years ago, and we have ongoing business with digital advertising. We wanted to elevate our brand awareness along with increase leads and new business.

How did you select this vendor?

We have been working with Major Tom since it was Drive and 6s. We liked the fact that they were a small boutique agency.

Describe the scope of their work in detail.

Major Tom helps with regular web maintenance and works to make any adjustments and creative needs we require on our website. Major Tom also helps on the advertising side, with Google, ultimately driving new leads to our business.

What was the team composition?

I work with the web development team as well as the advertising side, the account managers and executives.

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

Through testing of new advertising campaigns, over the past three years, our new business leads have significantly increased and have resulted in new bookings. Even though our website is dated now, we still get many compliments from our guests on how easy it is to navigate and use.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

On the web side it has always been very seamless as we use the project management tool, Done Done to track projects. It keeps everything super organized, is deadline driven and keeps a trail of your conversations. The Major Tom team is also very on top of any requests I have had and responds right away.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The team at Major Tom is always ready to help you solve your needs whether it's web development related or advertising and business goals.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Over the years we have had multiple account executives managing our account which has lead to a few hiccups in the handover, however overall we still enjoy working with Major Tom.