ROKi Digital

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the owner of Intelligent Engagement Ltd. I worked with ROKi Digital when I was in my previous position.

What challenge were you trying to address with ROKi Digital?

We were trying to transform our transcription business from external partners to internal systems for operational capabilities, so we hired ROKi Digital to develop those systems.

What was the scope of their involvement?

ROKi held workshops to help refine our current practices before translating them into technical support. They provided consultancy, data strategy, and business process analysis. They also used several technologies for integration and performance, including Stripe as a payment gateway, GoCardless for direct debit, Zuora for the subscription engine, and integration for Salesforce. 

What is the team composition?

We worked with several people, including business analysts, data analysts, and directors.

How did you come to work with ROKi Digital?

They had worked on similar projects with other subscription-based news providers, so we knew they were familiar with the technology we wanted to adopt.

What is the status of this engagement?

We worked together from January 2014–May 2018.

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

We saw that there was an effective translation of processes and improvement in operational capabilities. ROKi was helpful with the business side of the teams they worked with, and interfaced with the tech of our partners.

How did ROKi Digital perform from a project management standpoint?

The team did well and always pulled necessary elements together from all the involved partners. We communicated via Slack, email, and phone, and used Jira and Trello. They were quite responsive.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They understood our business objectives and had a clarity of thought regarding finding solutions. They also did a good job explaining those solutions in layman’s terms.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, not really.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be completely honest and open about your goals and your business, to give them a full understanding. ROKi will surely come up with a good solution for you.

Please describe your company and your position there.

Internal Systems manager for TVSquared, the global leader in TV attribution, serving advertisers in over 70 countries.

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

The key objective of this project was to enhance our online card payment facility to ensure it was compliant with upcoming regularity security requirements.

How did you select ROKi and what were the deciding factors?

We have previously worked with Rob and the team on several key projects with great success - their flexibility, transparency and ability to deliver on time and budget is key and works well with our growing business.

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

This project was a follow on to the original development undertaken by ROki to create a landing page and API integration to our payment gateway. ROki delivered this under extreme pressure to allow us as a business to enhance our cash collection process at an extremely difficult time as the Covid pandemic took hold.

The scope of the current project was to enhance the existing API integration for card payments to ensure SCA compliance.

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

Project manager and designer/developer

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

Having launched this capability earlier in the year, our payment collection has improved dramatically with a significant portion of our business customers opting to use this facility.

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

Initial scoping meeting held followed by SoW being signed off and project delivery date agreed. Kick off meeting to ensure all the pieces were in place with a check point/ walkthrough review meeting prior to delivery. Slack was the comms channel used by the team for day to day communication allowing easy and efficient dialogue within the team.

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

Our partnership with ROki has been nothing but an extremely positive experience, whether it's a short project with specific requirements or consultancy to review business process and looking at the bigger picture, ROKi are perfectly placed to assist us.

We have complete confidence not only in their ability to deliver but the easy, transparent way it happens. The relationship we have with ROki is more an extension of our team than just a supplier/customer one.

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

none

Please describe your company and your position there.

At the time of the engagement, I was the Head of Product for WeSwap, a P2P currency exchange platform.

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

We needed a trusted partner to help us deliver our ambitious product roadmap. At the time, WeSwap had established itself as a strong player in the FinTech and travel space, and we were in a position where we needed to scale up our development capability to continue delivering value to our customers.

We needed an outsourced partner who could work closely with us across our technology stack, and that could truly understand the needs of our business and users.

How did you select ROKi and what were the deciding factors?

We selected ROKi because they ticked all of the boxes for us. A lot of other software development companies are only interested in writing the code, and not in the relationship or becoming a true partner of the business.

ROKi were always keen to work in a collaborative manner with us, which was the main reason for us selecting them (on top of the fact they demonstrated their excellent development capabilities)

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

ROKi worked with us across our technology stack, and helped us deliver front end, back end and app based code that meant we could achieve our ambitious roadmap. They worked closely with us, and became an embedded part of the team, from refinements through to sprint ceremonies and beyond.

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

One of the key advantages of using ROKi was their ability to quickly scale the team up and down as our business priorities changed. We had a core team of a project lead, tech lead and software developers/ testers, which we then added to as more projects and product features came along.

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

We delivered many projects and product features with the help of ROKi, including a first to market feature that allowed a target exchange rate to be set for the currency exchange. ROKi delivered measurable value across our conversion funnel, and helped WeSwap become an even better product for our users.

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

Typical communication was through Slack and Jira, where we managed requirements. ROKi slipped seamlessly into our agile delivery process, and we had no problems with communication throughout our engagement.

If there were ever delays to projects, the team lead at ROKi was always open and honest to the reasons why - which made the working relationship strong throughout.

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

ROKi's ability to adapt to the needs our business were their biggest and most impressive asset. They truly felt like they were part of our team, which made working with them fun and rewarding.

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

On one occasion we had a developer that was underperforming, and whilst the issue was tackled well, we had a short period where we were without a replacement. This is a small problem however, and was outweighed entirely by the overall flexibility that ROKi gave us.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a Product Director at Equals, a Financial Services business offering International Payments, Expense Management and Multi-Currency Travel Cards to corporate and retail customers.

For what projects/services did your company hire ROKi?

We hired ROKi to help us develop and launch the website for our US business.

What were your goals for this project?

The goal of the project was to have a functioning website which enabled us to communicate our value proposition to the US market and capture new customers.

How did you select this vendor?

A selection of 10 vendors who had extensive experience in web development were identified through research and word of mouth. We undertook a 3 step selection process which required vendors to: Step 1: All interested vendors were asked to provide a high level overview of how they would tackle the project based on the scope provided by Equals. Step 2: Shortlisted vendors were invited to a face to face interview with our Head of Web Development, Head of Design and the Project Lead (myself) to discuss their approach in more detail and answer a series of questions from the panel. Step 3: A small selection of vendors were then picked to present their detailed plan in a face to face meeting with the Chief Product Officer and the members of the panel. ROKi were selected because they were able to provide a very clear execution plan as well as building a nice rapport with the selection panel.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

What was the team composition?

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

Since launching in February, we have onboarded several new businesses and our brand recognition has increased in the US. 

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

The delivery of the project was managed using agile methodologies. ROKi provided us with a process which dovetailed effectively with our own and regular sprint ceremonies were set up to ensure effective communication and collaboration to deliver the project. 

What did you find most impressive about this company?

ROKi was extremely flexible and respectful of our preferred ways of working. This enabled us to work together seamlessly and effectiely eliver a project which had a very tight deadline. We were able to turnaround the delivery of the website on time and within budget, which is a testament to ROKi's ability to adapt while remaining focused on deadlines. 

Are there any areas for improvement?

N/A