Spectailor

Please describe your company and your position there.

Rangda & Barong is a high-end & luxury jewelry design brand established in 2006. I am the brand director, responsible for both the sales and marketing efforts of the brand.

For what projects/services did your company hire Spectailor?

After a challenging year due to Covid-19, as Rangda Barong, we needed a renovation regarding our sales channels, and in our case, the e-commerce platform required the most attention. However, being in the luxury jewelry industry means we have to face many different pain-points regarding online shopping, such as trust design.

What were your goals for this project?

Essentially, we needed to renovate our e-commerce platform. However, we also wanted to understand our customers and their journey better while shopping online.

How did you select Spectailor?

We met them through mutual contacts in the industry; however, choosing them was another story. We did not just need a design studio; we needed a growth partner. So, Spectailor's strong understanding of our business, performance marketing, and ability to implement this know-how to product design inevitably created a bond between our companies.

Describe the project in detail.

The project had two main phases, UX Research and UX & UI Design. We've kicked off the project with an inspiring design workshop, deep-diving into the industry know-how, creating prototype personas. That was an excellent opportunity for us to untangle the present problems together.

The Spectailor conducted a series of in-depth interviews with both existing and potential customers, presenting a detailed report on valuable insights, pain points, expectations. After that, we've moved on to the design phase.

They provided many deliverables such as information architecture alternatives, user journey maps for different personas, and even creative briefs for our photoshoot to ensure the product photography applies perfectly to the new website design. In the end, they tailored a unique and fresh e-commerce platform for us.

What was the team composition?

They've assigned us a team of three people, including a UX Researcher, a UX strategist, and a designer. We were able to work directly with our strategist and researcher throughout the entire project.

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

In our previous e-comm, we had many problems resulting in lower conversions on any KPIs we had. Even after our new platform's immediate launch, we have started experiencing a significant increase in our conversion rates. Visitors are now much more likely to subscribe, making our 1st party data collection a lot easier and facilitating our other marketing efforts.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

We enjoyed working with Spectailor a lot. They delivered well beyond our project requirements, and we did not experience any problematic issues. They were always available when needed, which made benefiting their know-how quite effortless and pleasant for us.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

We found their level of commitment and overall customer experience quite delightful. It was easy to work with them since they had stellar attention to detail. While they managed the project splendidly, they never held back when we needed their guidance on anything else as well. We felt like we had an in-house team of professionals the entire time.

Are there any areas for improvement?

In our opinion, they performed wonderfully! We are looking forward to working with them again in the future.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I work for a User Research and Design consultancy named Blink. We do extensive research for big name companies for digital products (website, apps, physical devices) as well as design and dev work. I am a Project Manager and manage around 5-7 projects at a time.

For what projects/services did your company hire Spectailor?

We had a large international project where we wanted to understand customer behaviors around online shopping habits. We were studying shopping behaviors of people in 8 different countries and Turkey was one of the countries we were researching. We partnered with Spectailor to handle the moderation and analysis of the research in Turkey.

What were your goals for this project?

We wanted to understand the shopping habits of people in different countries and how it is similar and different to habits in the United States. We needed to partner with a company that could conduct the research in the countries native language and report the findings back to us in English.

How did you select Spectailor?

Our company has never worked with a agency in Turkey before, so we used a simple google search to look for a UX partner in Turkey. Spectailor was the first company to show in the results.

Describe the project in detail.

We submitted an RFP to Spectailor, which they returned in a timely manner. Once we had chosen them as a partner, we had a kick-off call to talk through the goals of the projects. Our company wrote the participant screener and the session guide, which we delivered and reviewed with Spectailor.

Spectailor moderated all of the sessions and wrote us a topline report of high-level findings as well as transcribed all of the sessions in English for us.

What was the team composition?

The Blink team was composed of a UX Director, a Researcher and a Project Manager. We worked directly with Sezen Uzuncavdar, Spectailor's Head of Strategy and Business Development. Sezen managed the Spectailor team (their Researcher), so our communication was directly with her.

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

We loved working with Spectailor and were very happy with the results of the research. They diligently collected tallies/tracked participant behavior for us and for the purposes of being able to lift info like "3/6 participants expressed were skeptical of sales events," their topline was helpful. They met all of the deadlines that we agreed upon in the kick-off and we had zero project issues along the way.

How effective was the workflow between your team and theirs?

I felt the workflow was seamless. We set-up a Slack channel for easy communication, and set-up calls when we needed to have deeper discussions about the work.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

We were extremely impressed by their attention to detail. We felt the workflow was seamless. There are a lot of difference between questions we might ask participants in the US vs. what you might ask participants in Turkey.

Spectailor did a great job of working with us to modify our questions to be appropriate for Turkey and explaining why. They also worked late in the evening to accommodate the huge time change, and were clear and upfront in their project communication. 

Are there any areas for improvement?

There are no areas for improvement that I can see. We had a wonderful experience and look forward to partnering with them again in the future.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the global marketing and education manager at HRD Antwerp. We are based in Antwerp, Belgium, but we also have labs in Istanbul, Turkey, and Mumbai, India. We provide certification of diamonds, gemstones, and jewelry, and education for B2B professionals in the industry.

What challenge were you trying to address with Spectailor?

We had been focused more on the B2B market, but we wanted to expect our reach into the B2C space as well. We wanted to integrate both our B2B and B2C needs into our user experience design. The most important thing that I wanted to focus on was creating awareness at the B2C level. I wanted to create some awareness of our brand certification program.

What was the scope of their involvement?

They designed the UX, but they also did UI designs as well. 

What is the team composition?

I had one point of contact from their team. There were more people working behind the scenes, but he gave me all the updates.

How did you come to work with Spectailor?

They were referred to me. One of my friends in Turkey knew them and that is how I found them. I also met with other companies before deciding on Spectailor.

How much have you invested in them?

We spent around $60,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

I am not sure about the timing, but I think we started working together around October 2019, and we wrapped up around February 2020.

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

They met all of our goals. We first developed a roadmap of what we expected from them as well as a timeline, and they met all those metrics for me. I was really happy working with them. It was a nice project.

How did Spectailor perform from a project management standpoint?

We shared some documents among us for project reviews. Anytime I needed help or information, I would just call my contact. From time to time, we would look at the progress and that is how we managed it.

What did you find most impressive about them?

They really understand how to do business. They understood what I wanted, what the business position was, and how I wanted to shift the business focus. They’re also very customer-centric which was very nice.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I would like it if their prices were lower, but in light of their performance, I believe I had a good deal with them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

You need to be very sure about what you want and your communication needs to be very clear. They will also always lead you if they see areas of improvement.

Please describe your company and your position there.

Revital Clinical is a tech-enabled service specializing in Cosmetic Surgery, Hair Transplantation, and Dental Aesthetics. I am business administrator of the company.

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

The services we provide to patients introduction of plastic surgery packages in Turkey, can be defined as sales and after-sales services. The field we work in is a very competitive field. We thought there was something seriously missing about the websites.

Rather than the websites, the companies that work in the area were using Social Media more. However, that way was not the good way for the patients because the patients could not access the information they wanted. And every time there were serious mistakes. There are different languages spoken in the countries where we work.

It is an undeniable fact that most of our patients come from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Italy. That's why our website had to be 3-language when starting. And our website had to have an understandable design language that does not tire the user. www.revitalclinical.com had top goals as Seo.

Therefore, we demanded that this be prepared with a technical infrastructure suitable for today's and future conditions.

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

We received offers from many companies. We interviewed all of them face to face. We devoted some serious time to this. Among these companies, there were also companies from England, Holland and Italy.

However, what the team provided us was really remarkably good, in terms of reference works, delivery date and schedule, and cost. So we decided to work with the team.

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

We started with a pre-project tender meeting. There we gave them our requirements. After this, they got the job. Another round was for kicking off the project. There the team was introduced.

We worked in three main milestones. End of the design, end of the front/back end and testing. We used all the tools for meetings and collaboration, for example slack, jira, and zoom for meetings.

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

1 project manager (+1 project manager in the absence of the project manager), 1 ui/ux manager, 1 designer, 2 front end developer and 2 back end developer worked for our project.

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

We tripled our website traffic in a very short time and doubled the time spent on our website.

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

We had a good contact with the Project Manager. And also we could reach the designer teams easily. So the communication was top notch. The team uses an agile approach for the development and we could get any respond in a timely manner.

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

I can reach them easily and I can tell what we require and easily handshake for the deliverables. Overall, they have quite a lean approach with an A+ quality outcome.

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

The team did what it takes to finish the project. We couldn't have a better service.