MARTEC360

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I have a company called StarPoints Services, and I also was the owner and founder of Equestrian Collections, which I recently sold to Choice Brands Group. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with MARTEC360?

MARTEC360 is involved with Choice Brands Group and was heavily involved with my company when it was Equestrian Collections. We wanted to migrate our site and chose the Everest platform. I was looking for a company that would act like an IT division of my company to come in and configure the new site on the new platform. They also needed to help us on an ongoing basis with things like pay-per-click, organic search, and the technical side of assessing the Everest site, which didn't support parametric search out of the box like I needed. They also needed to be able to do vendor inventory lookups on a regular basis, which wasn’t supported by Everest. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Two years ago, I sold Equestrian Collections to Choice Brands Group. Once they had acquired us, they wanted to re-platform from Everest to their homegrown system, which they did but not successfully, especially on the organic search side. As they took our company in, they realized the different style of management and level of technical expertise that we had. That helped them with their decision to get off their homegrown system onto the system that we’re going to be implementing in a couple of months: Magento ERP/Acumatica/Savant/Salsify/Salesforce.

On the Magento side, it is the professional ERP version, not the community one. On the technical side of that, there is the actual testing and SEO that my company is doing with MARTEC360. They’re heavily involved in the day-to-day project management, and that’s been extremely helpful. The Acumatica side is a lot more data-focused, including setting up the accounting. They did the requirements for that and are technically involved to some degree, but I’m not as familiar with it since I tend to focus more on Magento.

With Savant, which is a warehouse system that they chose, they are involved with maintaining project availability, keeping the inventory correct multiple times a day, and making sure that the requirements are met. Also, they’ll be involved with some of the tests on that.

As they made that decision, they were looking for a similar company to come in and help them with that. They knew of Andrew and MARTEC360 (E2 Solutions at the time), so they selected his company to help with that particular transition, which they’re doing now.

I’m very much a part of Choice Brands Group. We consult with them and provide a lot of their personnel, so we’ve kept that relationship. A year ago, Andrew decided to change the name to MARTEC360 to reflect the broad range of services; the intersection of marketing and technology.

How did you come to work with MARTEC360?

We had a detailed requirements list for the platform. We chose the platform first and then asked the Everest company for companies that they had worked with to help us do the implementations. MARTEC360, who was E2 Solutions at the time, was one of those, and we interviewed probably half a dozen of those. I was looking for a company that had those technical smarts, and the only one that I could really find after interviewing a fair number was E2 Solutions.

We ended up choosing E2 Solutions after I interviewed Andrew Shelton, the founder, personally. He seemed to be a really good fit. I remember saying to him, “Why should we choose your company?” and he said, “Because you have to. To do all that you want to do, you need a company like mine to help you with those implementations.” He was correct. I don’t think any other company had the technical expertise to do what we did together.

How much have you invested with MARTEC360?

They signed a contract on a per-month basis for $60,000–$70,000. On the SEO project, they have a $100,000 run rate plus per-year costs while we’re involved with them. We have an ongoing commitment for technical help.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them 11 years ago [in 2006]. It’s an ongoing, day-to-day commitment on the SEO side as well. It’s fairly significant and will continue to grow as we add extra pieces. They’re becoming basically a part of our team, which they were for me with Equestrian Collections. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or impact of the engagement?

We’ll have metrics when we eventually start the projects. Right now, we’re just getting through the project management. We feel like we have MARTEC360’s daily absolute commitment when we were on the phone with them and in day-long meetings with them for various pieces.

How did MARTEC360 perform from a project management standpoint?

They started, like everybody else, a little weak in that department, but now that we have the tools and they’ve matured into a fully developed company, the project management is excellent. We used Wrike as a project management tool, and that’s been quite effective. They keep timelines and everything else in tandem with each other so that we have a view of the entire project, which is pretty complex.

We have a view of whatever projects we’re working on with them, and we can all see past the timelines and Gantt charts. They’ve invested in their technology and are getting some really good project managers onto their team.

What did you find most impressive about MARTEC360?

They get the overall vision of what companies like ours need in terms of melding end-to-end marketing and technology, as well as using data to make well-informed decisions. They had to wait for the technology to be able to do everything, but they’ve been first adopters of new options. They gave great recommendations when we’ve needed or asked for them. MARTEC360 also works with other companies and makes sure that we can implement what we want. I think that’s really their strength. Andrew is like me: we’ve been in it since the first day and built up skill sets that few other companies have in terms of knowledge of the internet, e-commerce, and the market. We’ve been in the trenches for as long as it’s existed.

Are there any areas MARTEC360 could improve?

They could get their arms around the breadth of the services that they offer now. It’s hard to understand what you’re going to do and have the internal fortitude and resources to be able to implement that full vision; they’re in that process like every other company is.

They could stand to bring in more necessary resources. It’s easy to say you’ll do it, but I think that growth is a challenge for every company. I do see them taking all the necessary steps to make sure that they can.