WP Buffs is positioning itself to be the best technical support partner for any individual, business, or organization with a WordPress website. They handle unlimited edits, performance enhancements, daily maintenance, and regular security troubleshooting so their clients and their customers can focus on content and creative work. This allows companies to make bold decisions about their website without hesitating due to technical restraints and spend their time on higher-impact tasks. After the success of WP Buffs, they’ve also launched WPMRR, a robust video course that teaches WordPress professionals how to implement, sell and execute ongoing care plans for their clients and increase their revenue every single month. Alongside that, The WPMRR WordPress podcast entirely focused on growing successful WordPress businesses and monthly recurring revenue without taking itself too seriously. Their remote team is seven employees strong,  with the core team located in the US and other digital nomads distributed around the world. Joe Howard, founder and Head Buff at WP Buffs, discovered Teamwork Projects after searching for project management software that could help his startup scale quickly and effectively with a remote team. He chose Teamwork Projects for specific features that could help him run an efficient business, but since then, he has discovered a whole host of other tools that help his team save time and deliver more value to clients.

“Systems training? Easy. Onboarding new team members? Simple. Everything we need in one place? Already done. I don’t know a better way to scale a business than to simplify everything, and that’s what Teamwork.com does. It’s advanced enough to do whatever I want yet simple enough to customize it to our business needs.”

Before Joe launched WP Buffs, Basecamp was his project management tool of choice, and he had no complaints. It was easy to use and helped keep his work organized in a way that spreadsheets and other apps could not. In 2015, WP Buffs was a concept on its way to becoming a full-fledged company, and Joe knew that Basecamp didn’t have the capacity to grow with his startup.

“I wanted a tool that came from a company that could partner with me to provide robust software that my future 50-person team could use as well as my current five-person team. When I stumbled upon the Teamwork suite, it seemed like a no-brainer that this was the tool that could help me scale my team, company culture and organization to the moon.”

Since Joe knew from the start that WP Buffs would have a location-independent team, he tried to find software that offered project management features, help desk support, and internal chat messaging all in one place. Having a single software solution would allow them to focus on doing great work for their customers, not figuring out how their project management software works — or trying to teach their clients how to use it. When Joe found the Teamwork software suite that included project management tools, help desk support, and instant messaging, he decided to start with the free plan and add a few projects to see how it performed. Two years later, his team uses Teamwork Projects and Teamwork Desk every day.

Joe chose Teamwork Projects and Teamwork Desk for specific features, but today, the team’s favorite tools aren’t ones he was initially shopping for.  

Templates in Teamwork Projects save the WP Buffs team significant amounts of time from the moment they onboard a new client who needs the company’s CTO and technical expertise for their websites. The standard task lists that templates provide are clear outlines for team members so they know exactly what is involved in the care plans that WP Buffs offer. Team members can adjust the template slightly for each client’s individual needs, but they don’t have to start from scratch with each client.

“Templates make onboarding far easier and give all our developers the ability to be involved in any website set up. This helps us distribute the workload much more quickly, and allows us to give consistent care to every client.”

Teamwork Desk has been especially helpful for WP Buffs’ remote team members who are working different schedules across multiple time zones. Triggers reduce the number of manual inputs needed to update a project status and keep momentum going. People know exactly what work they need to do next without handoff meetings or messages, and that information is automatically available in the reporting features. Canned responses are another feature that Joe’s team has come to depend on. These boilerplate messages allow them to personalize responses to customers without having to craft a unique message every time they need to send a reply. And since the messages are standardized, WP Buffs’ branding stays consistent no matter which team member is sending the email! As the WP Buffs’ client and project lists have grown, Teamwork Desk has allowed them to scale quickly. They can add new inboxes for each new marketing firm, design agency, and WordPress freelancer the company works with. Because these inboxes are white labeled, the WP Buffs’ branding is perfectly coordinated at every level. Notification settings also get a huge thumbs-up from the entire team. Some team members get a message every time a ticket comes in, and others turn notifications off so they can work without interruptions for a block of time.

“Our team loves Teamwork Projects because they can work how they want and from where they want, and the flexibility of Teamwork Desk compliments that perfectly. This flexibility is a huge step up from making people work in one specific way.”

There are a few features in Teamwork Desk that make Joe’s role as founder and Head Buff a lot easier, including the reporting functionality. Several types of reports in Teamwork Projects allow him to measure results on a per-project and per-team member basis. In Teamwork Desk, the reporting tools let him review customer happiness, their ticket resolution times, and more. The data has even let them look for efficiencies within workflows so they can understand why certain clients are more expensive to service than others — and make adjustments.

“This instant analysis allows me to review things quickly and regularly in a data-driven way and communicate to the team where WP Buffs is doing well and where we need to improve. This is a great way to build company culture so we can all agree on how we need to move forward.”

Joe also lives and breathes by his Google Calendar, which keeps everything on time and on track. Teamwork.com can’t take credit for that software, but they built an integration with Desk and Projects, which means he doesn’t have to leave his digital calendar to see who has the day off and what open tasks are due today, tomorrow, and this week.

“This integration is just brilliant, and it’s great to know that Teamwork is adding new integrations with other apps that I might need down the road.”

All of these features have given WP Buffs the power to increase the amount of work they’re able to do and people they’re able to bring onto the team, but without increasing the amount of time needed to do it. Because Teamwork.com software automates repetitive tasks, they’re able to deliver products more quickly, maintain consistency across different projects, and in the end, deliver higher quality support than their competitors. Their clients are taking notice.

“Our clients tell us they love what we do not just because we’re helping them with the technical side of their WordPress site, but because we deliver quality results quickly.”  

Smoother workflows have made every aspect of doing business easier, and having all of the tools in one software solution has also removed a lot of daily complications and distractions. Time tracking, file storage, messaging, and customer support are all integrated in one suite, which increases efficiency even further.

“Previous software that we used simply wasn’t an all-in-one solution. Teamwork.com is. Their support team is also really quick to reply to issues and is always looking to improve things moving forward. Having a partner who’s focused on moving forward like our team is important for us.”

Joe doesn’t just turn to Teamwork.com’s customer support when he’s having a problem. Part of their support services include webinars, blog posts, and personal advice on how to optimize Teamwork Projects and Desk features for each individual business.

“I’m always learning from them about how to improve support for WP Buffs! I fully read every blog post that come into my email as well; lots to learn there. Teamwork doesn’t only provide great software to help me run my business, they give me tactics and strategies to improve my business in many different areas. Again, they just deliver so much value it’s impossible to ignore.”

In the end, every business wants more than better organization tools when they purchase project management software. They’re looking for an ROI that pays off to the team, their clients, and the future. For Joe, dividend comes with every invoice.

“When I make my Teamwork.com payments every month, it literally puts a smile on my face since I feel like I’m getting insane multiples of value based on what I’m paying. I couldn’t just move away from their systems and go somewhere else because, frankly, I don’t think there’s anything out there that comes close to this kind of value and functionality. It saves our team an immense amount of time every month and keeps us so organized that I couldn’t imagine another piece of software having more of a positive impact on our business.”
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