Feb 19, 2025
Your Adobe Solutions partner is supposed to help make your job easier and lower your total cost of ownership for Adobe Experience Manager (AEM) or other Adobe Experience Cloud products. But if projects take longer than promised, systems aren’t working as they should, and your team seems more frustrated than ever, it could be time for a change.
This post will explore some signs to look out for before your next Adobe project goes off the rails.
9 AEM Solution Partner Red Flags
Adobe Solutions partners are vetted problem solvers offering the expertise you need to help you maximize your investment in Adobe products like AEM. Or rather, they should be.
Here are a few red flags to look out for, whether you’re currently working with a Solutions Partner or vetting one for an upcoming project.
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They aren’t located in a time zone that overlaps with your own
If your AEM partner isn’t in a similar time zone to yours, it’s a problem. Your AEM partner should be in a time zone with no more than a 4-hour difference between your own. And not just the partner but, most importantly, the primary development team and project manager working on your project. While some large Adobe partners may have a team in your time zone, they could outsource your project to a development team with a 10+ hour difference.
When that happens, communication takes longer, which means new features get to market slower, details get missed, and the likelihood that things are done incorrectly the first time increases, costing your business time and money.
On the other hand, the 4-hour time zone overlap allows your solutions partner to respond to business-critical requests quickly, provide updates on the project status, and meet with you to discuss changes in strategy.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn provides a local development team on the West Coast of the United States and a near-shore development team that operates in the East Coast time zone, allowing us to support clients across the entire continent.
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Communication about the status of the project and timeline is infrequent
If you aren’t getting regular updates when you need them, it can spell disaster in several ways. Some digital agencies receive a project, and you don’t hear from them again for another month, even if you ask for updates. Or, there might be communication, but not at a regular and predictable cadence.
This infrequent communication about project status or changes to the proposed timeline can make it difficult to determine whether risks need to be addressed or whether more resources will be needed to complete the project.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn development teams operate in two-week sprints, and status updates are available on a dashboard that everyone can access. Once you know where to look, it is easy to understand what the team is doing and whether there are any issues.
Additionally, clients are invited to participate in daily scrums, which are held in US time zones (and in English) so that issues can be resolved quickly and the status is easily understood. Project managers are also readily available to respond to client requests and provide direct updates.
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They frequently miss deadlines
If your Adobe partner isn’t meeting the deadlines they outlined with you at the beginning of the project, this should be a cause for concern. One or two can happen on any project, but it’s a definite problem if it occurs frequently. These issues are usually caused by poor project planning but could also be due to unexpected blockages, increased costs, or a lack of resources.
How Oshyn Solves This: Missing deadlines can happen on any project. However, Oshyn offers steps to reduce the number of missed deadlines and ensure that projects are completed on time and within budget. Along with a dedicated project manager to ensure everything remains on track, Oshyn follows a culture of accountability built from over 20 years of serving clients in the CMS and DXP space.
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They don’t understand the marketing team’s needs and priorities
Most enterprise websites are tools for helping marketing teams deliver the highest-quality digital and customer experience and hit annual targets. However, many digital agencies and Adobe partners are web development shops that don’t quite understand what marketers need from their DXP or website. If marketing needs are not understood, the final implementation will likely not help marketing teams reach their targets.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn collaborates with marketing teams to help them achieve their goals. This includes our design support services, which allow a business analyst and software architect to translate design specifications into functional website features and beautiful designs. If something can’t be built, we collaborate with you to make the proper adjustments. This approach ensures that your Adobe implementation works well and your site looks good.
Oshyn acts as your marketing team's digital partner and offers ideas on how to better use your existing software and incorporate new technology, such as artificial intelligence, to help you reach your goals.
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There is limited visibility into the current project focus
Do you know what your Adobe partner is currently working on regarding your project? If you asked them to show you their progress, would they be able to, or would there be excuses and stalling? If you don’t know what’s happening, you don’t have visibility into your project’s status. The problem could lead to a massive disconnect between their focus and your business needs.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn’s dashboards provide complete visibility into a project's status. During client updates, Oshyn details what is being worked on and demos new features. Client teams can also access Confluence boards to see what’s being worked on during the current sprint.
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You feel like you’re being steered in the wrong direction
Not every partner has your company’s best interests at heart. For instance, you think you should build a headless website to boost performance and meet your marketing goals, while your partner recommends a different approach that won’t meet those goals. Or they say you need to purchase additional software on top of AEM, but they don’t fully explain why. Problems like these often stem from a lack of communication, collaboration, and understanding of your goals.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn isn’t just a digital agency executing your software development project. We’re a true partner you can consult with. We prioritize your needs and ensure that our work is aligned with your goals and where you want to go and matches your available resources and budget, whether that means recommending another product or integrating with existing systems.
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They don’t communicate the latest trends and how they can be incorporated into the website
The DXP space is constantly changing, and new advancements are continuously being made, particularly by Adobe, one of the leading vendors in the industry. If your partner isn’t aware of the latest trends, including composability, then this could mean that your business falls behind competitors and misses opportunities.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn has been in the DXP space for over two decades and has gained a deep understanding of Adobe and the composable ecosystem. Additionally, as partners of other leading DXP vendors like Optimizely and Sitecore, we thoroughly understand the ever-evolving industry. We can ensure your Adobe implementation meets the highest standards and incorporates the most valuable best practices.
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They don’t follow agile web development best practices
Since its inception over two decades ago, agile has been the dominant web development methodology. Many digital agencies follow this approach because it focuses on iterative development, continuous feedback, and allowing developers to adjust to changing business requirements. However, many choose not to, and more often than not, that means longer development cycles and fewer updates.
How Oshyn Solves This: Agile isn’t the only way to do things, but it’s generally the best approach for both Solutions Partner and client. Oshyn follows agile development practices and breaks down development into two-week sprints.
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They don’t offer monitoring and DevOps support
If your partner doesn’t provide monitoring and DevOps services, you could experience serious performance issues if it’s not something your internal IT team can do. Without a complete understanding of the entire architecture, there could be gaps in your service that could cause you downtime. Problems like slow page loads or security issues could go undetected for days or longer, eroding the customer experience and impacting revenue.
How Oshyn Solves This: Oshyn offers DevOps services that include 24/7/365 monitoring for your site, all day, every day. We apply best practices to fine-tune your architecture, save money, and increase performance. Real-time dashboards give you a continuous view of your website's status, and alerts let you know the moment any issues or outages occur.
How Oshyn Delivers Value that Adobe Clients Need
If your Adobe partner is showing signs of any of these red flags, then it might be time for you to explore your options.
Oshyn is a certified Adobe partner with years of expertise in the Adobe Experience Cloud. Our experience with other DXP products also allows us to stay current with the latest trends in the space.
In addition to implementation, maintenance, testing to ensure product quality, and upgrades, we offer consulting to help you build what you need in the shortest time possible and avoid preventable roadblocks. We also provide Technical Audits, where we bring an ability to understand how marketing teams work, catering to rapid timelines, the need for agility, and a campaign-driven business model.
Unlike a traditional software shop focusing solely on technology, Oshyn understands that websites and technology must meet the marketing team's needs. Designs are reviewed pixel by pixel to ensure they comply with the technical specifications and can be an accurate representation of your vision, implemented seamlessly without breaking your budget.
How do we put it all together? Fairstone Financial was concerned about a drop in performance. Oshyn provided an AEM technical audit and more than 40 recommendations to improve Fairstone’s website performance, security, and stability. Read the case study to learn more, and contact us if you need an audit of your own.
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