More Space For Light

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Our organization is a corporate entity that markets South Australia travel and tourism to the world. I’m the senior manager of digital. I’m responsible for marketing technology, development, and innovation.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with More Space for Light?

We wanted to improve user experience by simplifying how data is filtered and sorted on our website. It has extensive travel and tourism information that’s available for our users. For example, thousands of different businesses are sitting in our database. On top of that, we have a content layer that includes destination information, articles, and stories. When you add all of those together, the resulting website is quite complex and difficult to navigate.

Internally, we have three software engineers and one person with design and marketing background. While we have in-house staff, we wanted to extend our capabilities.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

Initially, we wanted to get the data into a search functionality. We also asked More Space for Light to do some functional design work. In phase two, they improved the language used on our website so the consumer could understand it. We also simplified the layout and search functionality.

How did you come to work with More Space for Light?

They’re from the same area and we heard they were competent. My technical employees know the technical employees that work for More Space for Light, so they’ve been able to compare notes. We also know of other projects they’ve worked on. We like working with owner-managers—they have proved to be really effective for organizations like us.

How much have you invested with More Space for Light?

We spent between $10,000 and $50,000 on the project so far.

What is the status of this engagement?

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

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We see the work delivered as good value for money. We typically work with eight agencies for our seven websites. These are constantly being updated so we have a good feel for what is good value for money. We would put More Space for Light in a high category in this area.

How did More Space for Light perform from a project management standpoint?

They have good systems and everything is clear. They have good templates for the presentation of their work. If necessary, they come up with useful and innovative solutions for displaying information. Everything has been delivered on time. They would come and work in-house in one- or two-day blocks. At each sprint, the first two hours of the first day was always a review of what we’d done previously. At the end of each sprint, we discuss the next steps and delivery dates and we’ve never had any issues. We communicated face-to-face on a regular basis. We also used email and Skyped on occasion. They’re good communicators and are open to feedback. We feel like they add value to the conversation.

What did you find most impressive about More Space for Light?

They’re well-informed, innovative, and always looking for new solutions. We’re a difficult client to work with because we have in-house staff who has design, development, and marketing expertise. They respond to that quite well. If they make an observation about something and we tell them there’s a reason we do that, they just adapt to it.

Are there any areas More Space for Light could improve?

I can’t think of any for the project that we are working on. There’s going to be a limit to their output based on the size of the business, but that hasn't affected us.