Periscope Management Group

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the director of Black Keys Corporation, a contracting company. We do flooring, installations, maintenance, and carpet cleaning. We’re a small business, with eight full-time and four casual employees.

What challenge were you trying to address with Periscope Management?

We were looking for a company that could consolidate our online marketing presence. We needed to position our brand properly, with branded vehicles, clothing, and promotional material, and we wanted a company that could guide us in that sphere. Since we work on-site, and marketing isn’t what we dabble in, we hired Periscope Management to help bridge that gap and give us a more robust marketing presence.

What was the scope of their involvement?

We have a whole host of branded t-shirts and vehicles that we’ve done with Periscope. They made a simple logo that gets our message across, along with what we do. I had a meeting with my team to draft out the concept for the logo and ideology. Once we had a couple of sketches drawn, we had Periscope conceptualize it further and digitize the logo.

They also built our site, BlackKeysCorp.co.za. We were only using Facebook when we started the engagement and Periscope suggested that it might be a good time to migrate to a more formal platform.

We lean on them a lot for our digital campaigns. We’re in the process of launching our sister company, where we’ll do homeware and decorations. Periscope is now coming up with a marketing campaign to introduce that range.

We send them pictures and educational videos every month to get their feedback on how we can improve them, change the wording, add the music, and so on. We always send the team information for approval.

This week, we’ve begun talking about setting up a LinkedIn page in order to have more contact with designers and architects.

What is the team composition?

Lloyd (Graphic & Web Designer & Digital Marketing Executive) is my main contact person, and I keep in touch with two other people for design.

How did you come to work with Periscope Management?

I’d worked with them for a catering business I had a couple of years ago. I met Periscope through a client, and I was blown away by the banners, vehicle branding, and other marketing material on their site. We had a successful venture, and we kept them as our marketing partner after the change in business.

How much have you invested with them?

The initial quote was around 60,000 rands (approximately $4,000 USD), and we’ve spent 6,000–7,000 rands (approximately $400–$500 USD) on top of that. This includes branding for clothes and four vehicles, the website, and our weekly consultations.

What is the status of this engagement?

My first contact with Periscope was in 2012–2013. The current project started just before the lockdown around February 2020. Everyone globally had to reshuffle their business and make it work in this difficult time, so we were happy to go ahead and bring out all the things we’d been planning in the 6–7 months before this.

We completed everything 5–6 months ago. The website is live, and all our vehicles are fully branded. We’re still in contact with Periscope almost on a weekly basis. I’ve just asked them for some branded notebooks and pens for clients.

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

We’re satisfied with the site and its animations. Our entire team is using the apparel we’ve done through Periscope. We look like a brand that’s there to stand alone. As such, we plan to continue the collaboration for some time. We get excellent service from them, and we enjoy the energy and ideas they bring to the table.

Most of our business is coming through the website now, which is something that Periscope had alluded to. What’s more important, we’re getting the right kind of client, versus through Facebook where we’d just get random people. Clients see our marketing, and they’re going to our site with an idea of what they’re looking for. We’ve had a 30%–35% increase in calls.

Our Instagram page is also yielding good results. People post comments and questions on our posts, and we can engage with them a bit more. The website traffic, however, is something we didn’t have before, and it’s given us the opportunity to stand out from the pack. It’s nice to go to a site and have people recognize our brand immediately, rather than ask what company we’re from. We have a more beefed-up presentation since we’ve done our branding with Periscope.

How did Periscope Management perform from a project management standpoint?

Periscope’s turnaround is incredible. It may be because we have a long-standing relationship, and they are always eager to make a difference. My two contacts are very good. If we set up a meeting for Monday at 9 o’clock, we know they won’t postpone or miss it.

I’m very satisfied with the level of correspondence. If we call or send them an email about a deadline, stock levels, and so on, they’re very good at responding. I’m in direct communication with someone who’s my peer in terms of the position held, which is quite satisfying. I can follow up with them on what campaigns are coming up and what else we need to do.

I’m not involved in project management too much, and I’m not sure what tools Periscope is using. I’m not too concerned with this, as long as the results are satisfactory.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They’re hungry to work, and they’re good at what they do. For a small business like ours, working with a company that has Periscope’s caliber is very impressive. They have worked with reputable international brands, and they do branding work for a few NGOs here, which has reflected in their standard of work.

The most impressive thing about Periscope is the amount of information they put at our disposal. If we make a decision that we have to live with as a brand for the next 1–2 years, it’s always good to have it at the back of my mind that we can brainstorm with someone that’s going to bring a wealth of information. Periscope consults us on what we can improve and how we can better position ourselves.

We’re floor contractors, so we don’t know what the right times to post are, what content to post, or where it should be to be better positioned. It’s great to lean on someone with the amount of information that their team has.

Are there any areas they could improve?

Lloyd could shave his beard and get a cleaner look. There’s nothing I could mention from our side. I haven’t had any frustrations with them. They’ve been lenient when we were behind on payments, they understand the landscape of the business, and they deliver results.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Nine out of ten times when sitting down with clients, they won’t know what they want. I’d advise doing a bit of research before sitting down with Periscope, and making sure that they have a good idea of what the final product should be. That way, they won’t have to spend hours and hours coming up with a concept, only for the client to say it’s not quite what they’re looking for. It’s better to have some prior research in place, even if it’s just 5–6 snippets of people’s ideas.