Traina

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I was the director of marketing and communications for clinical products at Sequenta, which was later acquired by Adaptive Biotechnologies. It was a diagnostics company that sold a product to hematologists, which helped them understand the efficacy of cancer patients’ treatment.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Traina Design?

Our company was small at the time, with only 30 members. We had a lot of clinical data which needed to reach the physicians we were targeting as customers, and wanted it to be clear and attractive, in order to help our audience understand what we were talking about.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

They were our sole design firm; we worked with them on everything from brochures and other paper collateral, to our corporate and product websites, as well as a patient education website. They contributed a lot to making the patient education site useful, attractive, and compelling. The site focused on the patients who would need our product, with the goal of helping them understand the product. It demonstrated that they understood our product, and listened to what we wanted to do. When I came to them with the scope of work, they had the idea of creating animations as a way of showing off the product.

They worked more on the visual design side and not so much on messaging. We handled that part internally, although Traina definitely helped us with certain taglines. They also made the design for our product packaging, along with an accompanying booklet. It sounds simple, but it was actually a big project: we were trying to combine the visual elements with the information, making it so that people would use the product correctly. The process was iterative and collaborative. Traina took care of everything and gave me thoughtful options.

What is the team composition? 

Mark [Creative director, Traina Design] was our main contact initially. I worked directly with him, then as the amount of work grew, they assigned a project manager to help direct the process and keep everyone organized.

On web development projects, we would usually work with someone on the Traina side, along with a contractor. We had ongoing work all the time, and we communicated a couple of times per week.

How did you come to work with Traina Design?

When I joined the company, the VP of marketing I reported to had already engaged Traina. I believe that she’d worked with them in other places as well. I was set on using designers from previous projects of mine, but after working with Traina, I gave up the old ones and switched over completely.

How much have you invested with them?

We probably spent around $150,000 to $200,000 per year with Traina. It may not sound like a lot, but it was from a company with zero revenue so was a big investment for us.

What is the status of this engagement?

I started working for the company in September 2013 and Traina was already established. They were still doing work when I left in November 2015.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

They always do beautiful work; I loved their designs and attention to detail. They were great at listening to what I wanted to achieve and coming up with options which fit our goals.

Regarding our other marketing collateral, we got our message out, and prompted physicians to start talking about our data. They definitely got the picture from our content. On the product and corporate website side, their work led to a lot of visits and awareness. It’s a niche product, so it would be hard to quantify sales or revenue.

They helped us develop and launch a content hub for our website. It attracted a lot of attention from key opinion-leaders we wanted to get in front of and the content was shared around socially. We definitely achieved what we wanted.

How did Traina Design perform from a project management standpoint?

We communicated through email and phone calls. I always felt I was talking to the right person. Our project manager was always aware of what we were doing and everyone was looped in. It never felt that we had too many or too few people.

If I became busy with other things, they kept reminding me of what I was supposed to be doing, and what was needed from me. They were able to meet and exceed deadlines, and it was easy to reach out. I would change my mind on things, and it was never a problem; they made it incredibly easy for me. Internally, they work like a well-oiled machine.

What did you find most impressive about them?

I’ve worked with designers whom I had to tell exactly what to do. In contrast, Traina listened to my ideas and often came back with solutions that were better than I initially imagined. They understood how to make things look nice as well as useful.

The most impressive thing for me was their ability to translate sometimes mixed instructions and ideas into concrete designs. I might not have known that I wanted or needed something, but they would deliver it, and it was perfect when they did.

Are there any areas they could improve?

There was nothing that stood out. I would still be working with them, but the company I am with currently already had internal design resources. In the future, if I have a need for outside help, I will go to Traina in a heartbeat.

Do you have any advice for future clients of theirs?

Don’t go into it thinking you know exactly what you want in terms of look or other particulars. Instead, focus on the bigger picture of what you want to achieve. Trust Traina to help you find the best solution. They really are a creative and thoughtful team that can take you to places you didn’t know.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am the founder and CEO of Windward Academy, an online educational platform that is committed to making exceptional tutoring more accessible for students and lifelong learners.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Traina Design?

I wanted to design an educational website that showed students and lifelong learners that learning is fun, as well as important and valuable. I am concerned about the opportunity gap in our country, and it is a huge problem. I really wanted to ensure that our brand was represented as fresh, fun, and approachable, but at the same time, as a highly effective learning program.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

From the very beginning the team completely understood my goals. We started by doing the brand voice guideline. I worked with a member of their team to capture who we are, what the issues are, what we deliver, and what our value is to the customer. I then completed a survey about myself, my mission, why I care about tutoring, and more specifically, why I want tutoring to be more accessible. From the very beginning, their corporate team embraced both the philanthropic mission that I have and my mission for the company. Their understanding and enthusiasm set a tone from the beginning for an incredible working relationship.

Originally, Traina was just doing the marketing, and there were other firms hired to work on other aspects, specifically with the user experience for the e-learning site. The other firms weren’t on brand, and I felt there was a big disconnect, as it didn’t look as good as the marketing site. I wanted a consistent experience, so I ended up having Traina fix what the other firms had done.

Traina Design literally designed everything-- all the features that our company offers—from our logo, e-learning site, user interface, user experience, icons, to the way people click through and learn. They also designed icons for the various philanthropic campaigns that we offer and put together our pocket folder material that is given to both private and public schools.

Although consulting wasn't part of the scope, they offered ideas about how the lessons are designed and about the intro video bumpers for our lessons, and they identified music for them. They also designed the intro bumper for our Mindful Moment videos and made sure the information was presented well. They put together our list of lessons and documents about our community impact.

Traina always went above and beyond with any deliverable. A mom of one of the families I am very close to passed away. I decided that I wanted to make a memorial scholarship in her honor, as she was an integral part of the company and had made a huge impact on me. I reached out to Traina, and when they understood that this was my No. 1 priority, they dropped everything, designed the icon, and refused to charge me for the time it took to do this. This is exceptional in terms of character and customer service, and in terms of wanting to be a part of your client’s experience and journey. That example really speaks to the quality of people they have working there.

What is the team dynamic?

Kerri was our main project coordinator. She and I would always email, but the rest of the team was always available to me as well. There were four members of the team with whom I regularly worked, and they remained consistent throughout. They have not had a change in their personnel, and we have been working together for over a year at this point.

How did you come to work with Traina Design?

After having terrible experiences with other firms, I reached out to Traina Design. A friend who had worked with them previously referred me to them. At that time, I had interviewed five firms, and Traina was the glowing winner among all of them. They were very professional and attentive and had extensive examples of their work that fit well with our various projects. I had asked every firm I interviewed to give me one example of a contribution they made to a project for a client that really set the tone for their success. Traina explained that they were hired to do all of the marketing for the new Jacobs UC San Diego Hospital. Prior to building anything, they had the idea to create a mockup of one floor of the hospital and then run it for one week with all staff and patients to double-check the flow and make sure it was planned in the best way possible. I thought this was a brilliant idea, and it showed me that Traina doesn’t just care about making something pretty. They want to make sure it works for a client and that it fits the client’s needs as well as the consumer’s. This sealed the deal for me.

How much have you invested in them?

We have spent around $75,000 over the past year. Within the industry of website design, and with designing an e-learning site, the cost is completely reasonable, especially considering the quality of their work.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in April 2015.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

Parents as well as students often give positive feedback regarding the aesthetic design of the site, how well organized it is, and how easy the site is to use. Everyone has just been blown away, and some have literally described the site as breathtaking.

How did Traina Design perform from a project management standpoint?

Kerri, the project manager, and I communicated through email on a weekly basis. Kerri could not be more attentive, punctual, caring, and professional. She is communicative and transparent about everything. Traina’s project management really sets the bar for other firms.

What did you find most impressive about them?

The most impressive things about Traina Design are their quality of work, attention to detail, and the fact that they complete things punctually and on budget. The team members are personable and kind, and they really care about the project. They are very conscious about providing options that will fit within my budget, as they know we are a startup. They take their time assessing how long something will take and the cost involved, and they always honor that. It has been unprecedented for me, after working with other firms, to actually work with people who produce the highest quality work on schedule and on budget.

The biggest gift for our company has been finding this exceptional team and making them an integral part of everything from the beginning. If they had coding expertise as well as being a design firm, it would be perfect, as their attention to detail is unparalleled.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I wish they were less expensive; however, you get what you pay for, and they are very fairly priced considering the quality of work they deliver.

BACKGROUND

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I am an employee of Facebook.

OPPORTUNITY / CHALLENGE

What challenge were you trying to address with Traina Design?

It was brand awareness and brand scaling of the Facebook IQ brand; it was in a relatively nascent stage. The scope of the project that we approached them for was to rebuild our brand identity and help stabilize our creative direction for the brand moving forward.

An ancillary goal for the project was to make sure that we stayed within certain budgetary constraints. We are a smaller team in the organization, we don't have unlimited budgeting resources to spend on these projects. We had to make sure that the work was done in the most economic fashion possible. That was a big aspect of the project moving forward.

Within Facebook, we had no working relationship with Traina prior to this project. We were working with them for a couple of marketing deliverables but no large scale projects. We were working with a number of external agencies based out of either London or New York or even San Francisco and other types of firms were part of the RFP process when this branding work came up.

SOLUTION

What was the scope of their involvement?

We started by scheduling a kickoff call. They got on the phone with us to understand what our business needs were. We also got an overview of their services, their staff, information about their company, and work that they had done for clients in the past. After that, we went through an RFP process. They did all the paperwork in a timely manner and then once we submitted a SOW and raised the PO they actually flew out here to Menlo Park, in northern California, to meet with us in person. We conducted a series of interviews with key stakeholders from teams that Facebook IQ works directly with, as well as primary marketing leads with Facebook IQ. They essentially showed up on campus to do an audit of where the brand was at. They also did some market research to figure out who the competitors were for other practices, not just in the Bay Area, but globally. They presented the research to us and presented the findings in a comprehensive audit. They came back to us with a presentation on their strategy for rolling out creative improvements over a 12 month period. They then provided us with estimates on the work, and the scope of deliverables they would be working. We approved the deliverables and jumped right into the project.

We were a smaller team with a large organization. I raised a concern in the very beginning that it was critical to us that whatever brand language we created for Facebook IQ, closely maps the overall parent brand of Facebook. They operated within those constraints and did an amazing job with the work. Beyond that, we have a lot of stakeholders, because it is a large company, so they had to juggle feedback from a lot of different directions. Often times that feedback was conflicting, but they always adjusted to that feedback in the best way possible. They did the extra work to make sure that we were presenting the work in a way that was amenable to those people with differing points of view. Additionally, we had to do this work on a very quick turnaround compared to most large scale branding campaigns. Specifically, we had goals to meet in terms of brand awareness and traffic to the site. We are also embarking on a website redesign as well. We needed the core assets for the brand to be built on a very short timeline, and they were able to accommodate us on that as well.

What is the team dynamic?

I was working with the principal David Traina. Our lead project contact was Katherine Hyde and then we also had a relationship with Matt Bachmann, associate creative director Joe Ross and second creative director who was Mark Gallo.

We explained to them what the creative needs were and they provided the personnel. Everybody that I know that I came into contact with was extremely professional and polite. 

My main point of contact was with Katherine Hyde. Throughout the course of the project, she did most of the managing of the timelines and schedules to make sure that we were hitting the deadlines. If we had any concerns, she was the person that we reached out to first. We had weekly check-ins with her throughout the entire duration of the project, which was a great idea because things were shifting constantly on these accelerated timelines. Tuesday of every week we would get on a call with Matt and Katherine, and we would give them an update on where we were with the things that we were supposed to deliver to them. They would give us an update with their progress on the work that they had promised us, and if there were any problems that arose or issues with timing or issues or feedback, we would address all of those points of concern in those weekly meetings.

How did you come to work with Traina Design?

Price was the huge point of competition; we evaluated a lot of different people and some of the people that we introduced to our team, their numbers literally came in at twice the amount of Traina came in that. Price was a huge determining factor for us, but also the quality of the work. Working with Traina, they demonstrated to us creative excellence by showing a site that they had done for clients in the past. They were on par with all the agencies that were were asking for twice the amount of money to do the work. My job is to evaluate the creative and not think about the numbers so much, and look at things from a purely creative point of view. I thought the quality was up there with all the other agencies that were part of that RFP process. When the numbers and timing came in, it became a no brainer.

When selecting vendors, you want to work with a vendor that has some awareness of your brand already. My experience with working with vendors is that there is there's a ramp-up time that's required when you bring on a new vendor. Traina had worked on some marketing deliverables for us leading up to this project, so they had an awareness of our brand that also contributed to their ability to deliver on the expected outcome. We had a working relationship with them;  they understood what the goals of the brand were in the long term. That also  allowed us to complete the project on an accelerated timeline. They hit the ground running and delivered things for us to react to very very quickly. 

How much have you invested with them?

We've asked them to make adjustments to that SOW multiple times. In the past two years, we've spent probably more than $350,000 with them. That's not just for brand work that's for marketing deliverables for templates for video where for bumpers for PowerPoint presentations is for all kinds of events. That number covers a lot of work that they've done for us. We estimate for a certain set of deliverables, and as the year progresses. The organizational changes changed the number the deliverables that we had to optimize for, and Traina was always super flexible with us on the numbers, the scope of work, and pivoting on the fly.

What is the status of this engagement?

We began working with them August of 2015, and they have an ongoing professional relationship with Facebook.

RESULTS & FEEDBACK

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

We went through a website redesign and our traffic has doubled. That's obviously due to a number of reasons. It's not just because of the rebrand itself, but that's the one metric by which we can apply data and analytics to the results. We've received positive numbers in terms of growth and reach. I don't have a lot of awareness of what those specific metrics are. All I know is that all those numbers are positive across the board and we haven't really receded in any regard. Our team is growing and our output is increasing, but we can also scale and we can grow more rapidly now that we have a system that we can rely on. We're not making creative decisions in a vacuum. We know how to brand some that we can mass decisions to which makes it easier to produce a higher volume of work.

How did Traina Design perform from a project management standpoint?

They did a great job on the project management. They take on a lot of responsibilities that would typically be on the client side. They did a great job of communicating clearly when they would have things delivered by can they never miss. If they told me they would have to be by noon, they would have to by noon. Maybe an hour is the most they ever missed a deadline. There were never any major red flags that got me in trouble or got the team in trouble.

We used video conferencing often. Email was also a primary form of contact.   They're based in San Diego we're based in Menlo Park. We had a couple of in-person meetings, but the vast majority of the meetings with stakeholders happened over video conference and then all of that in between the back and forth that happened in between those meetings happen through e-mail and then in times when we needed more accelerated communication, I would talk to the project manager through Facebook messenger.  

​​​​​​What did you find most impressive about them?

The most impressive thing is the level of creativity that they deliver across the spectrum. It's not just in the pitching or the lead-up, or in the logo. They are detail oriented on every asset down to the final revision. A lot of vendors will creatively exhaust themselves and check out a little bit. 

Are there any areas they could improve?

One thing that they can do a better job of is to have a repository that I could go to that had an archive of everything that had gone back and forth between us, instead of having to go into my e-mail and dig up different things.  When I have to retroactively go back and figure out where those assets are it's all neatly organized into a single repository. My constructive criticism would be that they can more proactively organize the different assets that they're delivering and keep them in a single place. 

Do you have any advice for potential clients of Traina Design?

I think the old model is that you would go to some agency that had 80 to 100 people that have strategic planners and comms planners and media planners and people at every stage in between. I do think that there are specific instances where you want to go to those traditional agencies, but in the case where you need good work done and you need it done quickly and you need it done affordably, Traina should be your default choice in those instances. They often operate with such a nimble team that they can accommodate requests of most agencies. Right now, they're working on another branding mission with a different team, and they are asked to turn that we work around basically on a five-week timeline and nobody else can do it except for them. That was another way they impressed me.