State Creative

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and lead consultant at Belleview Consulting, a company of business consultants. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with State Creative? 

We hired State Creative because we needed a new website. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

State Creative built our website from scratch. I provided some documentation for it, but they walked me through exactly what they needed, so I didn’t come in with anything particular in mind. 

Previously, I had a one-page WordPress website. By contrast, State Creative built a multi-page website that had a space for services, case studies, and insights. They also used WordPress, but they added robust features to it through extensions. 

What is the team composition?

I worked with Garrett (Managing Partner), and he was my main point of contact. 

How did you come to work with State Creative?

I was referred to State Creative by another colleague. I looked at their portfolio and it resonated with me; I liked the variation of their work, which was tailored to their clients — they weren’t just copy-pasting one template. Then, as soon as I received their quote, I realized we could afford them, so going forward with the engagement was a no-brainer. 

How much have you invested with them?

We invested a little over $10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project lasted from February–September 2021. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

After State Creative developed our website, I gained access to more data than before. We could also navigate the website with more core elements and functions. Moreover, I could better understand where people were going and how they interacted with the website. On top of that, I had more data to spot trends and make informed decisions going forward, which I didn’t have before. 

How did State Creative perform from a project management standpoint?

State Creative’s project management was great. They kept me on track and on task. Our communications were typically initiated via emails, and then we’d do Zoom calls as needed to review finer points. In addition, having one main point of contact made it easy to keep track of who should communicate with me. 

What did you find most impressive about them?

We had a fabulous experience with State Creative. The team set strong expectations in the beginning, and then everything progressed in accordance with those expectations. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

If I was doing this project over again, I might have selected different options in terms of the website elements. I learned that I didn’t enjoy writing copy for the site. To be fair, it was my choice to keep that on my plate and not theirs. 

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Reach out and have a conversation with State Creative. You’ll quickly get a sense of how they work. If there’s good chemistry between you and them, then you can move forward. 

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the founder and owner of Makeplease.com, a global online platform that connects freelance artists with people that want custom art and designs.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with State Creative?

My company already existed, but my website was poorly designed; it had glitches, and it was outdated and confusing to use. I hired State Creative to do a total rebrand and create an entirely new website that functioned smoothly and let users navigate it effortlessly.

My main goal for this project was to attract a broader and larger audience to have more signups and see more things happening on the site — I wanted to have something that I could be proud of and market more.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

I requested State Creative to create a new website for me that was cleanly designed, looked good, functioned really well, and was easy to use. I wanted our users to take advantage of my website features without being confused and not knowing what to do, and I wanted them to use it without it glitching or having any problems.

They’ve created the site and added a lot of new and highly beneficial features, which have really helped with the signups and the overall UX.

What is the team composition?

I have only one point of contact, but I know that there’s a whole team working behind this person. Their team includes UI/UX designers, developers, and graphic designers. I also talked to Garrett (Managing Partner) in the beginning.

How did you come to work with State Creative?

My mom was in a networking group where Garrett was in. She connected us, and I really liked his vibe — it seemed like he and his team would produce something really good. I saw State Creative’s portfolio, and I could tell that they would go above and beyond to create something good.

How much have you invested with them?

I’ve spent around $14,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in October 2020, and our engagement is ongoing.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

I’m extremely pleased with how the website has turned out. It’s beautiful, easy to use, and easy to navigate. I’ve shown it to a lot of people, and I’ve only gotten positive reviews — it is better than I could ever have imagined.

I love what State Creative did and the way that they implemented the graphics that I already had. I’m extremely satisfied with their work and really excited about my new site. I can finally be proud of what I have, and I feel like people are much more enticed to sign up now.

How did State Creative perform from a project management standpoint?

State Creative is very communicative, and they always keep in touch. They’re quick to respond, and their responses are very thorough. Nothing is overlooked, and everything is addressed.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The team is very friendly, fun, and professional, and communicating with them has been a really good experience.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t think that there’s anything State Creative could improve on. They’re great, and I haven’t had any problems with them.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Stay on top of everything, be clear about your needs, and be timely with the things that they want you to do. If anything comes up, tell them right away so they have time to deal with it, figure it out, and stay on pace.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

We’re a local organization in Redwood City, California that awards scholarships to high school seniors who demonstrate extraordinary levels of community volunteerism. Our criteria's simple. Students have to reside in Redwood City and demonstrate levels of volunteerism above and beyond what’s required by their schools.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with State Creative?

Our website was old and limited in functionality. Students specifically expect to be able to apply online. To have a healthy, robust organization that actually serves students, we needed to do a better job with our website and application process.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

State Creative completely redesigned and rebuilt our website. They also added a custom e-commerce function. Usually, we have an annual awards dinner that’s attended by 400–500 people and each honoree. We wanted an e-commerce function for people to buy tickets to the event or enter a coupon code to zero-out the price. The e-commerce function essentially automated ticket attribution and table assignment.

Their team also build an online application process. Users could upload documents and fill out an application form on our website.

What is the team composition?

I had one point of contact.

How did you come to work with State Creative?

I searched online and asked five agencies for quotes. We found two agencies through referrals from board members. We found the other three from services such as Clutch. We had initial calls, looked at samples, and invited three agencies to give us a hard bid. We made our decision based on their track record, understanding of the project, and price.

How much have you invested with them?

We spent around $15,000 on this project.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started our contract with them in April, and the project finished in September 2020.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Anecdotally, everyone thinks the website’s wonderful. It looks better, and it’s easier to navigate. However, we haven’t entered our application or ticket buying seasons. We haven’t had a chance to test the functionalities in real life yet.

How did State Creative perform from a project management standpoint?

State Creative communicated deadlines, expectations, and milestones. I worked on many websites with one company. As we repeatedly collaborated, we developed a shorthand. During this engagement, I had to learn a different system, so it was a learning curve.

What did you find most impressive about them?

There was no drama during the project. We didn't argue about what was or wasn’t in the scope. I wasn’t surprised by the directions their team took. State Creative made everything clear, so the project moved forward linearly.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There were a few moments when we couldn’t access our PayPal account because State Creative was linking it to our site. It would’ve been helpful if they told us when we wouldn’t have access to the account.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Be clear about what you want. Don’t be afraid to ask questions.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

We are a consumer products company in the art/writing instrument space. I'm the Associate Manager of Digital Marketing as part of the Marketing team.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

We hired State Creative to help us overhaul, redesign, and condense our existing websites into one, consumer focused site. Our goals were to create a website with a consumer focused user experience while minimizing the amount of work our internal team needed to do to maintain our previous sites.

SOLUTION

How did you select State Creative and what were the deciding factors?

We found State Creative through a quick google search after speaking with several other companies all of who were referrals from other partners. The deciding factor for us was the price point given the size of the project, and the fact that State Creative was local to us.

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

We had 4 different websites that all pointed our consumers in different directions on 2 different CMS platforms that was causing quite a headache for our team. It was outdated, and clunky to work with. State Creative gathered all of the necessary information and documentation from us in the beginning. We opted to go for Wordpress, migrate the website to a different host, and wanted something with more imagery and much less text.

We then went through 2 different design rounds, and after that, they worked on it until it was time for our team to fill in all of the content. The biggest deliverable for us was the Store Locator, making sure consumers can reach a place to purchase a product as quick as possible.

Project Steps went as:

1. Scope & Documentation - information/inspiration gathering
2. Design Round 1 
3. Design Round 2
4. Demo
5. Content & Copy Fill
6. Launch

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

Two people from State Creative's team worked with us. Garrett, client services and Aron, the creative director.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We've had a huge spike in website traffic since launch. General feedback about the deliverables for us was about an 8/10. There were times where things were forgotten about, that I as the customer didn't know weren't going to be brought up and assumed the State Creative team would remind us, given the scope of the project in the beginning and the ideas we had talked about many times.

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

Overall, the communication was clear. We interacted via email, Google Docs, and even text towards the end for launch. The timeline was provided at the beginning, and we stayed on track.

There were a couple of times where there was mix up of us vs. other client work they were working on, so things I had brought up before were forgotten about or mixed up. As someone who comes from a small business background, I could understand the challenges of the multiple client aspect, but it wasn't always well received throughout my team.

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

How responsive they were! When small issues came up, I can shoot an email or a quick text, and they'd always get back to me and let me know the time frame in which they could work and figure it out. They're quick to help us find solutions and always open to helping us navigate issues.

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

There's some room for improvement in communication. When I got the project timeline, it was general enough that I knew of the overall steps, but there were parts of the content filling that could have been more in-depth.

For example, I thought that the store locator database would be brought up at some point, but it wasn't until after I submitted all of the content for State Creative's team to populate, and my team was already in the midst of filling in the rest of the content on the website, that I realized the store locator had not been talked about. We ended up having to try to shave time from elsewhere to get the locator done, but I would've provided that information up front with the other copy/imagery if I had known it was part of that step.

Because of that, we're now in a Phase 2 for the locator to be completed. I definitely think it's a bit of lack of communication on both ends, but as the customer, I'd expect the developer to guide me through that process and remind me of things we had talked about/what part of the project it'll come up in.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m a client manager for Kos Read Group, a public affairs and communications firm. 

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with State Creative?

We’d been working with our client Educate78. After auditing their materials and public communications, we decided that their website needed an update. 

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

State Creative took the lead on coding and developing the WordPress website. They helped create the initial design based on Educate78’s specifications, including their desired color schemes and look and feel. As a designer, I then changed up the designs using their original plans.

The State Creative team also helped train me and my team on how to use WordPress, such as updating modules and making edits. They taught us best practices about how to manage a non-profit website and retain people.

What is the team composition?

I directly worked with Garrett (Managing Partner, State Creative), but he had a full development team behind the scenes that we’d submit bug reports to. 

How did you come to work with State Creative?

I wasn’t involved in the search process. I believe that my boss was aware of Garrett and State Creative and that their proximity to our offices was a factor in our choice.

How much have you invested with them?

I believe we spent around $10,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project ran from November 2018 until August 2019. 

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We haven’t launched the site publicly yet, but our client’s board members really love the new website. It makes Educate78’s services and impact on the community that much clearer. The new site is also more user-friendly and has seen more traffic. State Creative helped integrate Google Analytics into the backend so that we can track visitors and our bounce rate. Overall, we’ve received nothing but positive feedback and haven’t seen any errors so far.

How did State Creative perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicated with Garrett all the time. He was always quick to respond whenever we had an urgent question or needed updates. He claimed a 24-hour turnaround, but I never had to wait longer than 12 hours to hear back from him. He also made every deadline, even when we’ve had to move some timelines up to meet our client’s needs. Garrett’s also always had a great attitude about handling any changes.

In the beginning, I talked to him about five times a week. Sometimes, when things got really hectic, we spoke twice a day. We received weekly updates, monthly maintenance reports, and heads-up if there’s anything that needs fixing. Even after the soft launch, Garrett has stuck around to help us optimize the site.  

What did you find most impressive about them?

State Creative’s level of detail and professionalism have made it so easy to work with them. We’ve had so many frustrating moments, and Garrett’s patience and diligence in working with us as we went through periods were much appreciated. 

State Creative is also excellent at turning around urgent changes very quickly—such as when we sent out a marketing email and find out one of the blogs isn’t updating or the links aren’t working—even though they’re not a 24-hour service.

Lastly, their team has never had to redo any part of the project. Their work is error-free every time. I’ve always been impressed with their ability to take our requirements over the phone and turn them into something beautiful.

Are there any areas they could improve?

No, there’s nothing I can think of off the top of my head. It’s always good to give constructive feedback, but I can’t think of anything I’d want to be done differently.

Any advice for potential customers?

State Creative regularly gave us all these tips and tricks, but they often got buried in our email threads. I’d recommend taking notes on the information State Creative gives you. They also created a guide page for us to solve specific problems later, which we found immensely helpful.

Also, don’t be afraid to get on the phone with them to communicate something as quickly as possible. Garrett was always happy to answer our calls.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

TForce Logistics is a provider of third-party logistics services for final mile activity to our clients. I’m the general manager and vice president.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with State Creative?

We had an old website that was outdated. We had also been purchased in the last couple of years and had gone through a name change, so we needed to update our website.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We gave them an idea of what we wanted to portray to our customers. State Creative assisted with everything from the design, suggestions for content, revisions, completion, and the built out of the website. They also gave us training on how we can maintain certain aspects of the site ourselves. They completely rebuilt the website on WordPress. The site is pretty straightforward in terms of detailing what we do for anyone that is researching us as a function of direct sales opportunities or seeing our name come across through various marketing channels. We have functionalities associated with the ability for low volume clients to use the site for tracking and tracing of orders. The site links through to our operating system, and also has functionality that has potential partners for us to go on the site, register, and communicate with us. There’s also communication capabilities for someone wanting to reach out to us with general questions or sales opportunities. State Creative had two primary resources working on the project as well as a development team.

How did you come to work with State Creative?

They’re located in the same building as us. I had referred them previously to other folks in the industry. We are owned by a conglomerate that owns 55 companies and they did some work for some of those other companies. We didn’t put it out to a competitive bid but I did verify those costs against both our previous provider as well as folks that had an idea of what the cost should be for that type of site.

How much have you invested with State Creative?

We spent between $20,000 and $25,000 for the site.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in the fall of 2016, and the site was completed and launched late in quarter one of 2017. I continue to ask questions if I need help. It helps that they’re so close.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

We track site views, but I don’t know where we are right now. I’ve received positive feedback from folks within our organization and folks that deal with our organization from a partner perspective. We’re very pleased with the outcome.

How did State Creative perform from a project management standpoint?

They did great. For any organization that provides that kind of service, they need to teach the client to maintain it as well. They were extremely flexible and responsive throughout the process.

What did you find most impressive about State Creative?

I would have a difficult time comparing them to anyone else because I haven’t gone through the web development process before. I’ve dealt with a lot of tech companies and my perception is that State Creative is small relative to some other agencies. They were extremely engaged all the way through from learning about the business and understanding what we were trying to accomplish, our target market, to helping us develop the site. I’m not an expert in social media or website development and they were able to accommodate, listen to, and respond to what I anticipated we needed.

Are there any areas State Creative could improve?

I had no issues with them. They were very responsive and executed to what I had hoped and expected.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I work at an asset management firm in Northern California; we have several branches. We have an asset management business, a family of mutual funds, and a research publishing business, which allows us to leverage our own models and research to help other financial advisors run their own business.

I came in as a research consultant and ended up serving primarily as the project manager on a website overhaul for our research business. My job was to work closely with our entire team here, and also to find a web development agency we could partner with to build a new site. I’ve been focused on that for the past two years now.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with State Creative?

Our research website hadn’t been updated in eight years. Everything on the site was hard-coded and highly customized, which meant that it was very clunky and cumbersome to make any updates or changes. We were constantly leaning on our old web developer to make updates, and it became costly to manage the site. Our site had not emphasized our subscribers experience so UX become a major focus as well. There were a number of issues we wanted to tackle. We wanted to redesign and rethink the way we were presenting content. It was important that we found an agency that would be willing to give us full ownership of the content management system so we could make changes and adjustments ourselves and avoid issues that we ran into previously.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

State Creative has a solid discovery process, involving detailed and thoughtful questions about our business, market, subscribers, target market, and the way we want to utilize the site. Then they provided a detailed document outlining exactly what the functions were going to be, including wireframes and a process for the design and development phases.

The design process was very thorough. Garrett Goldman, our primary contact, asked us to synthesize our team’s voice into comprehensive feedback about the design, to ensure things were as clear as possible. We used InDesign to provide feedback.

Once the design was complete, they worked on the development process using Laravel as our content management system. We weren’t familiar with Laravel, but given what we needed from a functionality standpoint, Laravel was the best choice according to State Creative. It fit our needs and didn’t have a bunch of bells and whistles that we weren’t going to utilize. It also made for a clean, easy to use interface on the admin panel. A number of people in our company can go in and make updates and they don’t need a background in programming to be able to do so.

How did you come to work with State Creative?

We threw out a pretty wide net and looked at about 20 companies as part of our vendor search. We reviewed online information and portfolios to narrow the list down to ten. We set up phone calls to discuss the project, then selected five firms to whom we would put out an RFP.

One of the differentiators that made State Creative stand out is that they’re a very process-driven firm. They have a tried and true method for building a website the right way. They were the only firm that asked for more information to help guarantee they could build us something great. They’re experts in what they do, and they’re not afraid to push back in a way that will be better for us in the long run. Another big differentiator was that we had one project manager throughout the life of the project.

How much have you invested with State Creative?

We’ve invested between $75,000 and $115,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

The project began in December of 2015, and our relationship is ongoing. We launched the site in March of this year and are now in maintenance mode. We hope to engage in Phase II to help polish the site after we learn more about how our users are making the most of the new platform.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

Could you share any evidence that would demonstrate the productivity, quality of work, or the impact of the engagement?

We are thrilled with work they’ve done. It’s still early, but we’ve gotten glowing feedback on how easy it is to use the site. Our user base is not the most technologically savvy group, so we wanted a site that was intuitive, easy to use, and very clean. It was important that we distilled the real value that we bring to the table. The feedback from subscribers has been great so far, and it’s also been positive across the firm internally. It looks like we spent twice as much as we did. I’m optimistic that this will translate in a quantitative sense, and I’m excited to see how that impacts our business.

How did State Creative perform from a project management standpoint?

I didn’t know it was possible to have such a positive experience going through a web development project. Garrett is excellent. I’ve worked on projects in the past, and almost always, there’s some big sticking point. State Creative sticks to a method that has worked for them, and I think we both positioned ourselves for success when we agreed to trust one another. State Creative is an excellent design shop and web development agency and we know our clients best. Things got a little intense leading up to the launch date, but that is to be expected. Having a consistent project manager was a big differentiator. Garrett was our advocate throughout the life of the project and ultimately helped us launch a successful new site.

What did you find most impressive about State Creative?

A high level of integrity and authenticity. We are not designers or programmers, and sometimes we may not completely comprehend the implications for a particular request, or something might get lost in translation. I felt that State Creative really cared about making sure we were confident, comfortable, and happy with the end result and the process to get there. They genuinely cared about doing a great job, and it really showed. The entire team went above and beyond to ensure we could all be collectively proud of the final product.

Are there any areas State Creative could improve?

There could be some improvement in the process around launching the actual site. Having a process around that which is just a dialed-in as everything else would have made it the launch even more seamless and solid. It would also have instilled confidence at a time that can be very nerve-wracking.

I would also suggest offering additional support after beta testing, once new users are adopting a new system. We can only plan so much before the human element highlights areas that can use some tending to/refining. Perhaps there is a Phase II project in our future.

BACKGROUND

Please describe your company and your position there.

I am a partner and an architectural/engineering firm.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

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

Create a website for an offshoot company.

SOLUTION

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

Friend of mine

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

Designed a brand new website using wordpress. went through a few mockups and then launched the site.

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

1, project manager

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Overall the experience was good

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

Good communication and on schedule. No complaints

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

They were very organized.

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

A little better qa/qc.