Two years after the pandemic transformed how its people work, marketing agency Quantious is thriving. It has doubled the size of its team and continues to deliver work remotely — from design and content development to event services.
“Our clients are all remote, and we rarely see them in person now,” says founder and CEO Lisa Larson-Kelley.
As COVID-19 took hold in 2020, Larson-Kelley had to close her company’s office in Nyack, New York and send everyone to work remotely, navigating a very uncertain environment. But her team didn’t go home unprepared. They had collaboration tools such as the video conferencing platform BlueJeans Meetings, and the willingness and agility to pivot to a new reality of work.
“We’ve been extremely lucky to have a steady flow of client work, so we couldn’t miss a beat. With BlueJeans and other tools, we’ve been able to seamlessly work together while being apart,” says Larson-Kelley.
Expanding Services for Clients
Even before the pandemic, Larson-Kelley’s team was already using BlueJeans Meetings as well as BlueJeans Rooms. This greatly eased their transition to remote work and helped ensure the continuity of their operations.
“We use BlueJeans to connect on a daily basis among our team members as well as with our clients. It’s just in our taskbar — we can just click on it and then jump into a meeting room anytime.
“And recording is great. It allows us to capture those customer quotes perfectly.”
Larson-Kelley’s team has been using BlueJeans to record and produce interviews for customer case studies, one of the new services they’ve expanded into during the pandemic. Previously, clients would hire video production crews to film these interviews in person.
“We’ve taken on those things that used to be done in person,” says Larson-Kelley. “And having the technology and tools at the ready to be able to step in and offer a solution was really what made the difference.”
The team particularly took to BlueJeans because of its ease of use, as well as the constant addition of new and better features.
According to Larson-Kelley, “it’s easy for people to just hop in there if they don’t have an account. And we can easily share our screens and have a nice crisp image too.
“Some of our clients would say, ‘Oh, I’ve never used BlueJeans before. This is interesting. I like it.’ So, there’s no pushback.”
Running Immersive Meetings via Portal from Facebook
To make their meetings more engaging and productive, Larson-Kelley’s team would often use Portal from Facebook. This video device is a revolutionary way to join BlueJeans Meetings. It features a camera that pans, zooms, and widens automatically, enabling participants to move and talk freely while staying within frame. Combined with BlueJeans’ Dolby Voice, Portal provides an immersive video conferencing experience without any distraction.
“It’s just so convenient,” says Larson-Kelley. “You can you move around and the camera follows you. It just feels like a natural conversation. To be able to use Portal instead of just the default video, to have that extra functionality, is really great for us. It’s super cool.”
Becoming a Distributed Team
Larson-Kelley has also been using BlueJeans to interview job applicants and onboard new staff. She has seen an increased number of applicants as well as more candidates showing up for interviews since shifting to virtual recruitment.
“It has definitely helped us deepen our talent pool. Now we’ve got people in here in New York and across 6 other states. I wouldn’t have been able to put together the amazing, talented team we have now if we weren’t forced to be remote. Our horizons are much further away now.
“So, we’re now a team of 15 across five different states.”
To help maintain the company culture, Larson-Kelley keeps a BlueJeans’ Personal Meeting so she can always be available to team members. Personal Meetings are permanent virtual rooms that are particularly useful for quick huddles and ad hoc discussions.
“My operations team likes to have what they call the ‘ops kickback’ on Fridays. They’ll just get in a meeting room and catch up with each other and chill out a little bit.”
As Larson-Kelley looks to further grow Quantious, she intends to continue working with BlueJeans as the company’s preferred video conferencing provider.
“Being a smaller agency in a big pond, I appreciate BlueJeans going up against the bigger players. And I want to be part of that.”
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About the Author
Sharni Medina is the Director of Customer Marketing at BlueJeans Network, where she is responsible for sharing the voice of customers through customer-driven content and supporting business reference needs. Prior to joining BlueJeans, Sharni worked at Hewlett Packard Enterprise, leading their customer advocacy and referencing organization. Sharni holds degrees in Education and Physical Education from the University of Alberta and a Masters in Sport Management from the University of San Francisco. Outside of the office, Sharni enjoys spending time with her family and traveling.
