The Hoffman Agency
Standing Out In the Crowded Tech Communications Landscape
The Hoffman Agency has built an unmistakable brand that is never satisfied with the status quo, open to intelligent risk-taking and fiercely independent; it was time for their website to reflect that same moxy. They approached Waltz Creative to collaborate on a site that made the Hoffman brand come alive online, even if it wouldn’t be everyone’s cup of tea.
- Website
The Challenge
Most communications agency websites look similar. Let us rephrase that: most communications agency websites are saying the same thing in the same way and the messaging becomes monotonous. Predictable. Background noise.
As an agency ourselves, Waltz is intimately familiar with the challenge of standing out. Hoffman wanted to address this challenge with a site that looked, read and interfaced differently than any other organization in the crowded tech space. Together, we set out to make something that would catapult past prosaic peers so that clients would experience Hoffman’s unique approach to PR and Communications as soon as they landed on the home page.
The Goals
In order to rise above the rest, The Hoffman Agency swiftly identified several must-haves for their new website:
- Reflect the agency’s culture, tone and global presence so that clients can quickly identify their “jam”
- Deliver a look and feel that (absolutely) differentiates from the competitors and triggers a strong impression
- Position Hoffman as a viable alternative to PR mega shops by highlighting their international offerings
- Optimize site map, messaging and graphics to ensure everything informs and engages the target audience, boosting overall engagement on the site
- Incorporate the stand-alone “What’s Happening” blog into the new site
- Ensure the user experience is equal on mobile and desktop
- Support the Agency’s push up the food chain into consulting services
- Present as a global company, not just an American or Asian company
- Retain the SEO standings of the old site
- Custom build a content management system utilizing a drag/drop framework for dynamic page generation
The Process
With the list of goals in hand, Waltz went to work building a website from the ground up with Hoffman’s punchy personality as our North Star.
Home Page
The typical Shutterstock photos, neutral color scheme and safe typography choices were not on the agenda for this home page. Simplicity that could never be misconstrued as boring welcomes visitors at the top of the page with a bold statement that immediately declares Hoffman’s brand promise: “Our core competency lies in making sense of complexity.” A daring color scheme, a dynamic dingbat and the hyperlinked word “complexity” are the only disruptions accompanying the statement. When visitors hover over the word “complexity” a meme of a complex math equation pops up. And right off the (ding)bat, visitors can tell that this Agency isn’t afraid to be different.
Globalization
The Hoffman Agency is an international organization that spans three continents. They wanted each of their diverse offices represented on the Contact Page. Waltz designed the page so that it was organized by continent, dividing the offices into North America, Europe and Asia Pacific. Under each of these headings, the visitor can peruse a full list of the offices on that continent. Each office listing has a photo of the team at that specific location, ensuring that the diverse personality of each team is highlighted.
Further supporting Hoffman’s focus on internationalization and localization, we installed TranslatePress to handle the array of languages. Selecting a plugin compatible with both the custom home page animations and the page builder modules ensures content accessibility of the entire website in all of the different languages and countries represented.
Content Management System
Hoffman also needed a highly flexible content management system to empower their team to handle frequent updates on their own. Waltz constructed a robust drag-and-drop page builder along with a series of custom-developed modules that allowed for dynamic page layouts while maintaining brand consistency, ensuring the site could continue to grow with the Hoffman team for many years.
The Results
The end result was a website that delighted the Hoffman team and had visitors stopping in their virtual tracks. We were able to visually tell Hoffman’s story in a unique and fun way that communicates their bold brand personality within a few short scrolls.
From the get-go, the line between the Waltz team and our team blurred and eventually disappeared. We were one team on a mission to create a website that jarred the status quo. We looked forward to our update meetings. They pushed us. We pushed them. They had ideas. We had ideas. The collaboration took on a natural cadence that made working with Waltz both a satisfying and fun experience. And I’m convinced a key to flipping the switch on a website that did jar the status quo.”
Lou Hoffman
President & CEO
Award-Winning Work
Beyond the glowing response from the Hoffman team, the new site also resonated with clients and prospective clients:
The objective of creating a quality experience and quality traffic worked. Comparing the new site’s performance for four months against the old site, you can see every indicator in the Google Analytics dashboard improved — the key one being that time on site is up 42.54% at 1 minute 50 seconds in contrast to 1 minute 17 seconds.”
2023 Hermes Creative awards winner article
As a cherry on top, the new website also received a couple of awards that the Waltz and Hoffman teams celebrated together:
While the awards are always a nice feather in our caps, our greatest success is helping our clients shine. We are grateful to The Hoffman Agency for the opportunity to partner with them in building this website that jars the status quo, and we look forward to watching it set the stage for their equally daring communications solutions.
