ScrumLaunch

Please describe your company and your position there.

GOGOPIX is a place for music fans to access and design custom visuals for music they love to stream. Fans and marketers can use GOGOPIX to make compelling and contextual Instagram story posts.

For what projects/services did your company hire ScrumLaunch?

We hired ScrumLaunch to help us validate some key user assumptions before we invested too heavily into design and development. 

What were your goals for this project?

We had two main goals for this project: speed and measurement. End-to-end functionality was also key to accommodating an experiment focused on a short window of real measurement. 

How did you select this vendor?

A colleague I admire now works at ScrumLaunch, and I took this as an opportunity to look at their offering. There are plenty of places to find developers, but it was ScrumLaunch’s focus on startups and the iterative process of feature testing that convinced me to hire them.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

ScrumLaunch developed a web-app for use in end-to-end, live consumer experiments that allowed us to distribute short videos to interested users via text. The project was executed in three distinct phases

Phase One consisted of determining the project objectives and clarifying the official product requirements. We met for a few working meetings and communicated with ScrumLaunch by providing a high-level system concept then answering their questions. From there we met to verify the end-to-end user flows and partnered with their design team on the content for their user interface.

Phase Two had some creative assets in progress; the ScrumLaunch developers built out all of the feature functionality once we gave them the specified user flow. We provided the final content, which was added before Phase Three.

Phase Three involved final adjustments with the content; ScrumLaunch performed an additional level of testing before the live experiment. They shared their documented results, and then we conducted our own additional testing, during which we found no issues.

What was the team composition?

We had a primary point of contact responsible for all of our objectives and who eventually managed the entire project execution. 

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

In less than one month, we were collecting phone numbers and distributing back videos to hundreds of people. This helped us confirm consumer interest and direct our app roadmap. Equally important were the business partner testimonials we were able to build that leveraged the web app.

ScrumLaunch understood our product requirements for speed and guided the process by limiting complexity. They properly handled all aspects of assurance and notified us immediately about unexpected hurdles.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

The project management was neatly organized. We were assigned a clear point of contact for each phase with overall accountability assigned to our primary contact. All the communication was very timely, which gave us great confidence about the progress.

Given the nature of the project, many of our objectives needed refining. We were often afforded the opportunity to answer questions directly from ScrumLaunch team members regarding implementation and feedback. I appreciated this interface with multiple experts during the project rollout, which I found more efficient than communicating only through an account manager. It also eliminated any surprises at the end.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

ScrumLaunch consolidated everything from our business needs to product interest measurements into a core system that enabled us to validate our early thinking. I was impressed with how quickly we were able to begin our market experiments, thanks to their efficiently developed solution. 

Are there any areas for improvement?

I would like to see more internal tools for startup clients, such as an experiment tracking tool to help approach and document a sequence of iterative experiments. 

Please describe your company and your position there.

I worked as the lead developer for the vLoop video platform until it was acquired. It was a platform used by thousands of professional and college sports teams.

For what projects/services did your company hire ScrumLaunch?

I needed development assistance for a long-term project to build a cloud-based video analysis platform and transcoding engine along with a responsive frontend.

What were your goals for this project?

I wanted to help sports teams of all levels use video to improve their performance.

How did you select this vendor?

I heard about them from a friend who had worked with them in the past.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

We built a responsive web application using Angular that allowed users to interact, clip, edit, comment, and draw on moments in video. We also transcoded almost any video format, including MTS, mov, wmv, avi, to mp4, HLS and webM playback formats so that they were all web-compatible. The ScrumLaunch team assisted in co-refactoring for the frontend and optimizing AWS CPU usage to lower transcoding costs. The project scaled to hundreds of thousands of hours of uploaded video. Together with the SL team we built a scalable video transcoding engine in Go and Python and also a responsive Angular web app.

What was the team composition?

They provided a dedicated software team of seven developers which I grouped into two scrum groups.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

We gained thousands of users, including professional, college, and high school sports teams. Some teams that I watched in the Olympics and on television were using the platform we built.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

Even though our team was distributed, all the developers were well-trained in remote scrum processes, so our development process was very smooth. I communicated with the team directly on a daily basis. They also don’t believe in proxy product managers, so there was no one standing between me and the team I was working with. I had total access to every member of the team at all times.

We used Google Hangouts, Slack, and Trello. We followed a scrum process and used Trello to manage our user stories and tasks.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

I think what makes ScrumLaunch stand out is their emphasis on communication and responsiveness along with the quality of engineers they provide.

Are there any areas for improvement?

They should add more design resources.

Please describe your company and your position there.

My company owns and operates digital publisher properties in various categories, and work with advertising exchanges and technologies to monetize our user base.

For what projects/services did your company hire ScrumLaunch?

I hired ScrumLaunch to build an ad technology and marketing automation platform to grow my portfolio of media sites to increase revenue per year.

What were your goals for this project?

I wanted to automate workflows and increase revenue with minimal manual work.

How did you select this vendor?

I received a referral from a friend that worked with them in the past.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

They developed API integrations using Yahoo, Taboola, RevContent, and Outbrain to automate significant elements of my workflow. Their team also provided me with the ability to create and optimize a large volume of ad creative assets automatically.

What was the team composition?

I initially started with one developer, but the team grew as my project scaled. I now manage a group of three developers, including a team lead.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

ScrumLaunch tripled my revenue by automating these processes. Their team made it efficient to optimized my media buying process.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

We primarily use Slack and Trello to communicate. They operate as if they are my full-time employees.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The speed and quality of their work are relative to their cost. ScrumLaunch does an excellent job. Their team quickly figured out the context of my industry.

Are there any areas for improvement?

Due to time zone differences, there were a few issues, but otherwise, my experience working with ScrumLaunch has been outstanding.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I’m the founder and CEO of Gipper. We’re a graphics creation platform for schools. 

For what projects/services did your company hire ScrumLaunch?

We hired ScrumLaunch to build an SaaS platform for schools that allowed them to quickly and easily make content for social media.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to build a scalable, SaaS platform that was responsive and allowed for privileged access.

How did you select this vendor?

A friend and advisor recommended them highly to us.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

They developed a scalable SaaS platform from scratch that allows users to create high-quality graphics for social media. We had daily video conferences with a project manager to ensure we were on the same page and staid up-to-date with development challenges and questions. ScrumLaunch implemented our UX with ease and were always available to chat through Slack. 

What was the team composition?

We worked with one full-time developer.

Can you share any information that demonstrates the impact that this project has had on your business?

Previously, we’d built an MVP in-house that had some success, but it had limited functionality and wasn’t very scalable. This new platform is essential to our business success. It will enable us to grow at a rapid rate, which is exactly what we were looking for.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

It’s extremely impressive. We collaborate on Slack and have daily video chats via Google Hangouts. Despite their team being offshore, their communication is great. They're also highly organized.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

They’ve been able to integrate with us and become a part of our team. While other DevOps shops tend to shy away from communication, ScrumLaunch ensures we always have an open channel of communication. They’re also extremely responsive, which is crucial to me.

Are there any areas for improvement?

No, not that I saw. There’s very little they can improve.