Terms
Wonder Jam Wonder Jam is "a family of brands who help entrepreneurs grow in a way that is soulful, shrewd, and spirited" according to the words immortalized by Daft Punk, harder, better, faster and stronger. One of the companies, Wonderly, builds websites, visual branding assets and membership software to help its clients "set their own mark". I spoke with its managing associate Allie Lehman and developer Matt Hart to find out more.
Fine art can be freelanced to freedom
"My background is in the art of fine and I spent my childhood taking part in an abundance of drawing as well as oil painting" starts Allie Lehman. "At high school, I had a great art instructor who, funny enough, told me that you could become an illustrator or graphic designer'' even though I didn't really know the difference between these two things! I chose graphic design , and took it up in college."
Allie left during the recession in 2009, and then went into Web Hosting Support. "It was pretty stressful, but I learned a lot about hosting servers, the process of how WordPress became installed, and every aspect of a website's design," she remembers. "In 2013, I started The Wonder Jam, now our parent company. I quit my job as a designer and started that full time."
She was working along with Matt Hart for a couple years prior to this; Matt Hart would create websites and she would develop websites for them. After that, they started working together regularly: "We've been working together for more than 10 years, beginning as freelancers. It was a natural collaboration. Now we focus on businesses that provide services and building WordPress websites," Allie adds.
Matt begins: "I do primarily WordPress development. It was self-taught during the first decade of 2010. Many users who were navigating the WordPress world and were thinking"We have to create CSS so that this theme can have the right colors' and that quickly became boring!" he smiles. When page builders like Beaver Builder and Elementor came into the picture, they were able to gain some versatility: "We could do things with a custom approach which really suited the unique requirements of our customers, and really satisfied us creatively."
From the very beginning of their collaboration, Allie and Matt have concentrated on "going custom in a way that is affordable", as Matt says: "We do only what our customers want, and not the things that our clients do not. This is something that our clients are concerned about. They aren't looking to make this appear like a mystery. They'd like to feel confident. And using these tools lets us do that."
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Allie adds: "In 2013, I began The Wonder Jam with my husband. We had started by freelancing by myself as a freelancer who was a solo artist. We also had Matt as a developer contractor. We had a desire to work. we were looking to be able to create our own thing, we desired that freedom." It was then that the Wonder Jam was born.
Soil, support and systems
"We live in Columbus, Ohio and it's an extremely welcoming and open-minded neighborhood for small business," she continues. "Matt came to visit us from Seattle and we started working with local clients; we'd stroll down the streets downtown, and check out all the different businesses we've worked with." In the year 2020, following seven years with The Wonder Jam and as they started to expand nationally, they made it the company's parent, which now has three brands that are sister brands.
Wonderly concentrates on businesses that provide services which include non-profits, authors chef's and fitness instructors. It also owns a brand called Basis that focuses on the retail industry as well as people who sell products along with a different brand called Studio Wonder, an events location and photography studio located in Columbus.
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Three brands that allow for the greatest amount of creative flexibility: "It allows our team to focus on what they truly want to do as well as individual processes to follow," Allie says. "Because Matt and I started working together from the start, we have 10 years of experience in our backs. I have pictures from 2017 showing us whiteboarding all of our processes, so that our clients feel truly guided.
"The Wonder Jam operates as the "soil" that provides all the elements that every small business requires to be able to go on behind the scenes, then each sister brand is able to "produce according to its own style and gets to do whatever it can with opportunities that present themselves. That lets all of the pathways be clear and free of obstacles that can create difficulties for running as a two or one-person enterprise," Matt continues. "We have a variety of businesses that are able to work in tandem."
For example, the Basis brand is primarily Shopify as well as e-commerce. However, occasionally clients want to begin blogging, and would like to create something better than the services Shopify provides. Thus, Wonderly comes in to advise the Basis client about processes that relate to WordPress. "We are able to support and communicate with each other and are a cohesive team even though each of us gets to focus on a particular area that is pleasing to them," he smiles.
"The Wonder Jam sits as an unifying foundation. Nobody has the final say in deciding who we should work with or how much revenue to do - it's really entirely up to the managing partner," says Allie. They share the resources of software and system for managing projects and client concierge. This allows each managing partner to book a project; the team members can then onboard the project and handle all the backend admin such as invoicing and contracts.
"It allows people such as Matt and me focus on the work," Allie smiles. "I think we've created an environment that is great for working in; the key is to make sure our clients have great experiences. When they contact us via email, they feel like they're receiving a timely response and they feel guided through the entire process."
Matt says: "We say we don't make designs for you. We design in partnership with you. We're not planning to go away for a few months and create something on our own. We meet a lot and let them see how the process works from start to finish, versus going away to our creative caves and making things by ourselves!"
Clients and contexts
Matt and Allie collaborate with lots of organisations that require the website to be accessible in many different ways. "Some of our clients are non-profits. And those tend to be really robust sites. They're probably too complicated or they've been around for a long time. So we are usually consolidating or condensing them so that the website could be more simple," Matt explains.
"We're also working with people who are looking for membership websites like those in the food industry," Allie continues. Wonderly's clients tend to be people who do human-service-oriented work: "They're fighting for equality, they're looking to talk to their audience a little differently. It's common for us to work with individuals who've invested a ton of their own passion, money and time in their venture," she adds.
Wonder Jam Wonder Jam brands work with all kinds of organizations, from national nonprofits to single-person entrepreneurs who are transitioning to full-time from a side hustle. "We've attempted to create structures that will meet both. We're figuring out what scales best as well as what needs to think about in a different way, in cases where the scale is dramatically different. This is a lot of fun to discover!" Matt laughs.
He adds "With charities, they generally have something established and they've identified all the legal hurdles they needed to cross. It's often the case that we can make this work, because we're not looking to make a fresh start." The team is going to reframe what they've experienced, and find what context might motivate someone to give, and make the donation process easier.
Early in the partnership, and with every single client regardless of the type of company and the size of the site, The Wonder Jam team talks about the concept of customer experience. "A site can be a device that's effective in securing a first sale, or it can help in attracting returning customers, or being useful. We usually ask, 'Is this a resource, or is it capable of fostering VIPs?' - which are the most valuable individuals to small businesses," Allie explains.
Matt and Allie both agree that websites should not try to cater for everybody and is crucial to have a plan of action. "Whenever we're creating a membership site, the number one thing we're thinking about is the desire for users to keep coming back be able to utilize it every time and feel like it's the best value they've ever had," Matt adds.
Case studies: Simi and Molly
Allie says: "One of our clients, Simi Botic, has an exercise community as well as a membership called Unmeasured and is centered around body movement, called"the Barre Method. She has such a compassionate perspective of 'Just get moving instead of looking to "punish" your body. There are many different options depending on your mobility."
When Simi first came to Wonderly the site, she only had a small number of videos to choose from and they were changed every week. "It allows for things to appear more curated, and also allows her to pair what is feasible with her time schedule," Allie confirms. "After about two to three years, we expanded the number of members, giving her the chance to give greater value to the people she serves this is awe-inspiring. We love that we're capable of changing our approach when clients' goals change; we're simply reassessing our design, making some tiny changes and implement them in the development."
Another customer, Molly Baz, wanted to change her platform and move to something that would be more distinctive and experiential. "Her brand's visual identity is dynamic and so specific to her. She wanted her viewers to feel 'live with her in this way They received recipes, updates, and all the kind of content that they were familiar with, but in a way that felt authentic and really specific to her personality," Allie explains.
We all know that Molly's fan base has grown to be so important for her. "To get it in a structure that is in line in with her aesthetic - changing the web page from "Ooh, it's a picture of Molly Go buy her cookbook' to something more significant, both inside and out of the membership. It adds many benefits," Allie muses.
"Something we've attempted to accomplish with each of our clients is think about what it's going to be similar for them when they're not in contact with us all day. We try to ensure they've got good systems in place for them to utilize the software we've developed to them. Molly's was a great instance of that." Matt agrees.
Future projects and more information
Matt and Allie are currently working largely with companies and sites that require "a massive lens of accessibility" for customers who are disabled. "We're cooperating with truly amazing groups who are working in order to get these websites as well as prototypes, which are approved by the groups of individuals."
The majority of them agree that, overall they've enjoyed a great experience when it comes to their clients "It's been amazing to just keep working with truly excellent people. The clients we work with are extremely considerate and we feel really respected," Allie concludes. "We have the privilege of working with really fascinating people who's values guide their job. It feels good being able to create things that are for them," Matt smiles.
Learn more on Allie Lehman and Matt Hart and their team, and think about joining them on thewonderjam.com and withwonderly.com.