YELK

Introduce your business and what you do there.

Flint Group is a global packaging and printing company with several business units. I’m the global marketing and communications manager responsible for the Flexography and ThermoFlexX (or Xeikon Prepress) divisions. I’m based between Germany and Belgium.

What challenge were you trying to address with YELK?

I initially brought them on for a project for ThermoFlexX. We were doing a new product launch, and I was assigned the product range quite spontaneously. I jumped into it and needed to deliver a lot of things, one of them being a completely new website. The product line had a website that was very old and had been managed by different agencies, which were really slow and not very supportive. I was on a very tight timeline.

What was the scope of their involvement?

In order to make the new site, we first had to make a WordPress clone of the old one. From there, we’d be able to make a lot of updates by ourselves. YELK put a clone of our old website on our servers, and I commissioned them to work on a complete redesign of that site in parallel to the migration. YELK also helped us with a brand book for our new product line, which included the design of new logos.

YELK is working for the Flexography business unit now, designing and developing a completely new website. It'll have connectivity with our marketing automation tool. We plan to launch the site in November 2020.

What is the team composition?

I worked with Vigen (CEO & Owner) and two other people from their team.

How did you come to work with YELK?

I’d been working with other agencies for many years, both local and remote. This was a project in the industrial area, where marketing budgets are never very high, so I needed to find a partner that could do the work at a lower cost. I posted a job on Upwork and had phone calls and video conferences with the agencies that applied.

I needed to trust that they’d be committed to delivering. A lot of agencies make promises in the beginning, but they don’t commit to those once the project starts. I gave YELK a small job in the beginning, just making a clone of the site, and I expanded the work based on that.

How much have you invested with them?

The cost of the first project was $25,000–$40,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working with YELK in March or April 2020. They delivered the website in May or June 2020, and I have them on a retainer now.

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

We received very good feedback from our management about the look and functionality of the new website. There’s a day and night difference between what was there and what we have today. We’re doing much more promotion on social media and seeing an uptick in quotation requests on the site. There’s very good feedback in general, and we’ve actually been told by our leadership to calm down a bit on the marketing. Getting too many requests is a good problem to have, I guess.

How did YELK perform from a project management standpoint?

I’m really impressed with their commitment to our time and schedule. They delivered what we needed really fast, and I know that I couldn’t have achieved the same results with the other agencies that my company has used. The timeline would’ve been impossible for them.

They give us daily updates and have timelines with milestones prepared before starting a project. At the end of the day, I have to relay their estimates to my internal clients, so integrity is very important. YELK has never let me down. They will not make false promises.

What did you find most impressive about them?

It’s their responsiveness. If something comes up, I’ll contact them and they’ll jump on it straight away. Another thing that’s very important to me is that YELK won’t say yes to everything I ask them. I work in digital marketing, but UI/UX and development are their expertise. They’ll often tell me that something I’m asking for isn’t recommended and then explain why.

Are there any areas they could improve?

The language barrier is difficult with one of the team members I’m working with, but Vigen ensures clear communication is met so it’s never been a problem.

Please describe your company and your position there.

swip.world is an innovation platform that helps companies solving problems by using Open Innovation and Crowdsourcing. I'm CEO and Co-Founder.

For what projects/services did your company hire YELK?

We have a WordPress site developed by another team which is not available anymore. Yelk took over responsibility for further development if this site, including updating all components, fixing compatibility issues, but as well designing and programming an elaborated new page on this site.

What were your goals for this project?

1. Update all components of the WordPress site
2. Create an attractive new page needed for my sales activity.

How did you select this vendor?

I published the task for goal on Upwork. The job post included a screening question which I used to probe version control knowledge. Many applicants failed on providing an acceptable answer, but Yelk attracted my attention by providing a profound answer. After a Skype interview I decided to hire Yelk.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

They updated all plugins, tested for any incompatibilities (there were a number of them), fixed them. They even highlighted some existing frontend issues which I did know. I didn't ask for, this check but I was happy to see their initiative. Thus they also fixed these issues.

I'm in particular happy about their own quality control as I made bad experience with previous freelancers. They submitted a proposal how to setup version control on my WordPress site. Based on this proposal I added my own thoughts and implemented it.

Next, they designed a new sales page, for which I've prepared all texts and basic structure (in text format). I was absolutely thrilled about their design proposal, which perfectly fits into the existing site design. They then implemented this page, both on WordPress backend and HTML/CSS/Javascript frontend.

What was the team composition?

I was mainly in touch with their project manager. He dispatched all work to the team. As far as I know, there were two or three other persons involved: at least there was a WordPress developer and a designer. Obviously the designer was only needed a few times where there was anything to be designed.

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

The Wordpress site with all updated went live once completed. This didn't affect my business directly but made sure there are no new issues arising soon. The new sales page is live, and allowed my to communicate my services in a proper way. This page is cruicial for expanding my business, as I'm using it for acquiring customers. I'm also planning to run campaigns promoting this page.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

The project manager was doing his job very well. He understood my requirements, and successfully made sure they were implemented correctly by his team. Thus he managed to relay my needs and also made sure only quality work was delivered to me. We used Trello as scrum board. I created tasks to be done there and used it to communicate my needs.

Yelk wrote questions and status updates were directly in the Trello tasks. This way, both parties had always a good overview of all tasks. We only had Skype calls very few times, the written communication went very well. At the end, they delivered the new code by submitting it to a repository on Github which I've prepared.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

The designed made awesome graphics / layout. The programmers managed to solve all issues. The project manager managed to relay all requirements and concerns in both ways equally. The quality of work was very high! I only needed to report few issues.

Are there any areas for improvement?

The work hours were slightly over estimation. This also affected the delivery speed. Next time I'll ask for a more frequent checkin / push to Github

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm a director of operations at a media company. 

For what projects/services did your company hire YELK?

We hired YELK to overhaul our design work, correcting and enhancing existing designs as part of an expanding web development effort.

What were your goals for this project?

We hired the team to enhance the UX of a web-based product, as well as re-think our ongoing design work. 

How did you select this vendor?

We made the decision to hire YELK after a comparison of multiple vendors that offered similar services and solutions. YELK was the first vendor to identify some of the problems we had overlooked, and they offered solutions that other vendors had not.

Describe the project and the services they provided in detail.

An existing design project was given to YELK to re-think and reconceptualize. The scope of their work included both web and mobile designs. They identified issues and solutions, sometimes including intelligently working around existing designs. 

They also provided technical guidance and documentation for in-house developers. Their work included but was not limited to web development in HTML, CSS, JavaScript, BootStrap, MySQL, and WordPress.

What was the team composition?

There were always at least two points of contact. We believe there was a group of 5-6 specialists handling our project in total, including a designer, front-and-backend developers, project managers, and assistants.

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

The YELK team made us re-think our project. They offered insights and solutions for an extremely complex design deliverable. More importantly, our in-house developers understood their solutions and were happy with their work.

How was project management arranged and how effective was it?

YELK's most outstanding quality was how they performed research on our project before starting it. The team lead participated in multiple meetings to fully understand the scope of work. They were able to isolate each layer of the project, dissecting the work into multiple points of task completion and goals.

What did you find most impressive about this company?

Our project was very complicated and required multiple layers of understanding. The YELK team took the time to study our "critical" needs and business logic. Using that analysis, the team was able to offer solutions and creative ideas to resolve some of our most complex problems. They probed our existing designs, finding work that other companies have missed.

Team's approach was was thoughtful and intelligent. They had a well-mannered communication style, and they were respectful to my time and vision.

Are there any areas for improvement?

The only improvement I can think of is the addition of more company talent, as we would like to hire them for more involved web development tasks. We are looking forward to working with them again in the near future.

Introduce your business and what you do there.

I’m the CEO of an investment firm. As a holdings company, we own smaller businesses. 

What challenge were you trying to address with YELK?

We needed a professional to develop our e-commerce website.

What was the scope of their involvement?

YELK developed our e-commerce site using WooCommerce. They also developed another site on WordPress for a different business we own.
The first step they took was to compile a list of requirements based on what I wanted for each of our companies’ sites. From there, they segued into the design phase before developing all of the platforms in question.

What is the team composition? 

The team included three people.

How did you come to work with YELK?

We searched for a company that could develop our e-commerce site for our new business that is launching this year. YELK had built other sites for me five years ago. When I had these two new projects, I simply reached out to them again to re-engage 

How much have you invested with them?

We spent $60,000.

What is the status of this engagement?

We started working together in June 2018, and the work is ongoing. The first site launched in September 2018, and the e-commerce site will go live this year.

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

For the first platform YELK developed, we saw a slight increase in traffic compared to the previous version. The e-commerce website they created looks much better. The team delivered on time and within the budget.

How did YELK perform from a project management standpoint?

Project management is good. There were no issues. They delivered on time and as expected. We communicate almost every day. We use email, phone calls, and Skype.

What did you find most impressive about them?

YELK’s communication is most impressive.

Are there any areas they could improve?

I don’t have anything I think they need to improve.

Do you have any advice for potential customers?

Make sure that YELK has the capabilities to perform the work you want them to do. They’re knowledgeable about e-commerce and WordPress development. I don’t know what other specific skill sets they have experience with, so I recommend asking. They did an excellent job for my projects. I recommend testing out a project with YELK and giving them a try.

Please describe your company and your position there.

I'm the owner of a custom software and consulting shop with a division of R&D

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

Since this was a new company, there was a need for a company website. The goal was to have a slick, eye catching and distinctive website.

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

The Yelk team had an impressive portfolio and their design style was close to what marketing envisioned for the final product.

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

The Yelk team took the graphic design of the web site and converted it into code. This was mostly javascript/css/html. The team worked with the graphic designer and backend developer to accomplish this project.

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

There was one primary contact, the project manager and he was the voice of the devs.

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

The site launched on schedule without a hitch

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

We had milestones, primary and secondary objectives.

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

I never had to explain anything twice, communication was stellar.

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

No

Please describe your company and your position there.

Information technology company Azul Systems, provider of Java Virtual Machines on top of the OpenJDK. I am the Senior Director of Open Source Projects

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

The development of a community portal for Java developers, foojay.io.

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

Experience and cost.

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

Key deliverable was foojay.io, we use Slack, JIRA, and Trello for project co-ordination.

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

About 5, management, design, user interface, and backend.

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

Feedback was great, foojay.io is a unique platform for Java developers and is the basis for collaboration throughout the community of Java developers.

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

Every week priorities were set on Monday morning via Slack, with a Trello board for managing progress, backlog, etc, and JIRA with staging servers. End of every week we assessed together what had been done and what could be different.

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

They have been very flexible and responsive. They were able to pick up new tasks and integrate them into the platform quickly and without fuss.

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

Everything went fine, no complaints.