New Adjustment

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the founder of Eventene, producer of a cloud and mobile based Event Management System for professional event planners and activity directors within companies and organizations.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We were looking to create a short introduction video of Eventene, to provide potential customers with an overview of what our product and service provides and how it could be relevant to them.

SOLUTION

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

I had worked with Mark Roush on a previous video editing project, so was already familiar with his company. He brought in a few additional team members and I was impressed with their experience and vision for our project.

Describe the video(s) and the process in detail, including the project steps and all stages of production.

After a few introductory calls to discuss the goals of the video, Mark provided a detailed 5 week schedule outlining the key milestones and deliverables. We were able to provide useful feedback at every stage and they were very accommodating at making minor adjustments.

Who did you work with and what was the feedback process like?

We worked mostly with Mark Roush, who served as the project lead. Darrell Williams was brought on a creative director and wrote an excellent script for the voice over.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The intro video is running on our home page (www.eventene.com), plus our social media pages, YouTube channel and in our email marketing campaigns. We're seeing an average view rate around 50% and an average view duration of 45 secs, which we consider to be quite strong.

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

Mark Roush was very professional and provided excellent communication throughout the project, both by email and occasionally by phone. They shared work-in-progress elements on Google Drive and Vimeo.

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

The team that Mark assembled was first rate and extremely experienced and professional. Their experience in translating complex issues into easy-to-grasp concepts in the short-form video was helpful.

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

I was caught off guard a bit on how many deliverables we need to provide them to build the 25 or so scenes in the video. It took more time that we realized to capture screenshots and video clips of our product to be used throughout the video. But I also realize there was no other way to capture the essence of our product since we knew the product best.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I was the founder and CEO of a company called PopClickle LLC. We did digital fulfillment for various media conglomerates.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with New Adjustment?

A fairly large media partner wanted us to put together a how-to video. To streamline the process, we hired New Adjustments.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

New Adjustments put together a series of animated how-to videos that we were able to white label. The team did all of the scriptwriting, animations, still shots, and voiceover work. The videos they produced were basically how-to commercials to walk our partners through the system we were using.

What is the team composition?

I just worked with Mark (Video Editor & Director).

How did you come to work with New Adjustment?

I've known Mark since I was very young because he's good friends with a mutual connection. He reached out to me when I established the company. 

How much have you invested with them?

We spent about $50,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project was from May–August 2018.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We always got positive feedback from our clients. Everyone loved their work. Thanks to their how-to videos, our helpdesk calls were reduced.

How did New Adjustment perform from a project management standpoint?

They were straightforward and easy to work with. We always knew what was happening and were able to follow along with the processes. The team was also really proactive.

What did you find most impressive about them?

Their communication skills and quality of work were excellent.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There’s nothing they could’ve done better.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CRO at a small software company for corporate wellness.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with New Adjustment?

We are a B2B software company, so our website is a branding piece — it’s informational rather than e-commerce. It shows who we are, our product, and different information. We needed our website updated for the year.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

New Adjustment was in charge of project managing our new website. They delivered a couple of animations, revamped, and overhauled our copywriting. They also produced some sales collateral, templates for future case studies, and copyrighted content.

I connected with Mark (Director) for their animation services, and when I shared the scope of the project with them, he mentioned that they could help with a lot of those things. We scoped out the project, and New Adjustment was able to understand the timelines that we needed things to be done. We wanted to redo all of the sales collateral, but that needed to match our website. They created a WordPress site from scratch, which was done in the first quarter of 2021. Then, we did a sprint and completed a lot of smaller projects.

The New Adjustment team was really strategic, so we switched to some contractors that could execute the brand vision that they’d created.

What is the team composition?

In total, I worked with about six people. I worked with Mark who project managed and did the animation. Darrel (Creative Director) did copywriting. Another teammate did website work, and he had a couple of subcontractors under him.

How did you come to work with New Adjustment?

We had a creative that we really liked, but she didn't have any web skills; she could do the creation, but the implementation was a bit rough. Then, she had a personal situation come up, so she couldn’t do work for six months or so.

We went out into the open market and talked to a number of agencies, but no one was really customizing their quote to meet our needs. People were throwing out bundles of services that we didn't need with pricing that wasn't fit for a company of our size. Mark was connected to the startup community and had a wide variety of people that he worked with, so he was able to put together a quote that was exactly what we needed.

How much have you invested with them?

The collaboration started off as a $7,500 monthly commitment. That amount ramped up when we were building the site from scratch and bringing in more people; then, it tempered back down at the end. I would say probably averaged out to about $10,000 a month. The total was somewhere around $90,000–$100,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

I started talking with Mark in July 2020. We did a couple of interviews, and we started working with him in August the same year. The project was finished in April 2021.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

The results were very quantifiable. We have a qualification standard, and before working with New Adjustment, we had a 50% lead quality. As soon as the new website went live, that jumped to 70%. The number of leads ultimately went up. We haven't seen organic search results jump that much because it takes time for SEO to build up.

However, it was incredibly clear that people who were shopping for our services and looking at our site before the rework decided to navigate away before filling out a form. Now, when they see our site, understand that we’re reputable, and fill out our form.

All other variables have remained the same. In our best month, we had a 56% lead quality, and 48% in our worst — our quality was always the same. It’s 100% clear that people didn’t like our previous site, so they left; now, they come to our site, like what they see, and fill out the form. People who are active in the purchase process are engaging with us because of the site.

How did New Adjustment perform from a project management standpoint?

For the first six months, the project management work went smoothly. Over the last three months, we had a bit more friction because I ended up dictating a lot of the creative direction. As we produced a lot of different, smaller pieces of content, we were looking for more input from a storytelling direction. We wanted to give them the data and have them turn it into a story, but they sought feedback from us a bit more directly.

However, that wasn’t a fault of New Adjustment — it was a sign of the completion of the project. Their job was just to revamp our brand; then, we needed to stop treating every project as a strategic engagement.  We used Basecamp for project management.

What did you find most impressive about them?

All of the people from New Adjustment that we worked with directly were fantastic. The WordPress developer had a lot of experience; he thought of different little details that a lot of creatives don't take into account. There were certain elements of the old website that we had to migrate over, and he checked off every single one and got it right.

The design was also good. We had an existing brand guide, and they worked within it — it didn't feel like we had to lose too much of our old stuff. Mark's animations were awesome, and the copywriter, Darrel, was great. He could take ideas that we’d had trouble explaining within our company for a decade, and he wrote it out in a way that was really simple. He made it possible for anyone to understand what we were trying to get across. Darrel was one of the best copywriters I’ve ever worked with.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Everyone on the team is super experienced — they just need to be assigned the right tasks. The communication style caused a bit of a breakdown at different times. We often sent long-form meeting notes. Although we used Basecamp, we didn’t break up tasks into manageable parts or text; we got a lot of distracting notifications.

Any advice for potential customers?

For project management, have clear preferences on how the work is delegated. Start off with a clear definition of what project management tool you’re going to use and how you’ll assign responsibility to different people.