This content is sponsored by House of Giants.
House of Giants is a web development studio for Denver businesses in the know. Founded by Colorado native Dominic Magnifico and two of his former colleagues in 2017, House of Giants began as a way to organize freelance gigs on the side while they worked for a larger web development agency. Frustrated by outdated industry standards, they started building their own client base, and eventually, "outgrew our corporate overlords."
While the two other founders have since moved on, Magnifico continued to expand House of Giants as its sole owner and developer. Since he focused on House of Giants full-time in 2019, he’s completed over 150 projects for more than 75 clients, ranging from local boutique shops to Fortune 500 companies.
Today, House of Giants is a small but mighty team of two: Magnifico, and House of Giants marketing and partnerships maven, Mel Banister (plus our dogs). Even as their portfolio of work has grown, they've stayed true to their rebellious roots.
“We like to describe ourselves as a punk rock agency,” says Magnifico. “It’s just a mentality of questioning everything.”
What Sets House of Giants Apart
In his time working at traditional web development agencies, Magnifico realized that certain long-established business practices were actually limiting the potential success and growth of developers and their clients. He noticed that most agencies are incentivized to present a single platform or program as a one-size-fits-all solution, rather than considering a client’s particular needs.“A lot of web agencies specialize in a content management system or a specific platform that they like to push because that’s what they’re good at," says Magnifico. "They’re going to tell any client that the thing they do is the right solution for them."
Alternatively, House of Giants keeps an array of tools in their arsenal, surveying all possibilities before deciding on a game plan. “We call ourselves tech agnostic," Magnifico says. "We don’t hitch our horses to one specific thing. There’s a ton of options out there, and we like to explore all of them.”
That also means staying ahead of the curve in an industry that’s constantly evolving – a task Magnifico felt was like pulling teeth while working at previous agencies. “When working as production level people, there’s always a ceiling," he says. "We were trying to make things better and keep up to date, and always met a lot of friction with leadership really stuck in their ways, people who had been removed from the production world for a really long time.
In the tech world, resisting change is a death sentence. While large-scale development firms have to run any little adjustment up the ranks for approval, House of Giants is a one-man band, giving them the freedom to incorporate fresh techniques and technologies as they become available. Think less boundaries, more innovation.
Digital Solutions That Produce Real Results
Beyond designing eye-catching custom websites, House of Giants builds digital solutions that produce real results. From their initial client consultations to our ongoing maintenance packages, House of Giants is a strategic partner as much as they are a web development studio. By prioritizing a thorough discovery process, they’re able to make informed, data-driven decisions that tackle each individual client’s issues.“A lot of agencies that I’ve worked at in the past are just yes men," Magnifico says. "They’ll talk to the client, the client will express a problem, and they’ll say, ‘Yup that is your problem and we will fix that problem.’ They don’t dive deeper into it and actually get to the bottom of what’s causing that issue, or if it’s actually the issue. So most of the time what happens on the web is that people will just give Band-Aid solutions for everything, until it’s just a stack of Band-Aids. Those solutions cause more problems than they fix, so we try to be very deliberate with how we solve those problems and diagnose them.”
As a strategic partner, House of Giants offers two main services: web development and web design.
Custom websites tend to be traditional marketing websites – something that gives a company an online presence and tells their story. More advanced websites are web application-centered, like online ordering systems, scheduling, anything with a dashboard or user login. But as Banister emphasizes, what happens after the web pages go live is what makes House of Giants truly special.
It's All About the User Experience
“What sets House of Giants apart is the maintenance packages after the fact," she says. "Dom will offer continued support. We want it to be very user-friendly on the backend for internal teams, if they need to go in and quickly change menu prices or a logo update or things like that.Creating a pleasant and efficient user experience for both their clients and our clients’ customers is the ultimate goal. “We leverage our user experience expertise to make those experiences clear and concise for the end user," Magnifico says. "We bake that into the very beginning of everything we do, because user experience in our field tends to be an afterthought more often than not, which is very frustrating."
Being lifelong Coloradoans themselves, Magnifico and Banister are dedicated to helping other local businesses level up their web presence. With a Colorado-focused SEO and a personal understanding of the Colorado market, House of Giants has worked with clients like Cheba Hut, The Colorado Nonprofit Association, and Shakey Graves.
“The corporate gloss on each coast doesn’t really exist here," Magnifico says. "Colorado people are unique in that we’re a no-bullshit type of community."
Banister adds that people are open to more fun, edgy, out-of-the-box ideas. "You can tell from our website that we love doing that," she says. "We can connect with brands on that level."
Because Colorado is a much more active community than other places, Magnifico says browsing on a mobile device is more common here. Especially in the food service industry, House of Giants ensures mobile website experiences are strong. They've built a niche working with local quick service and fast casual restaurants, many of which were in desperate need of an online facelift.
Small on Purpose
At the end of the day, House of Giants never wants to lose sight of why they started the company in the first place.“We’re small on purpose," Magnifico says. "We don’t want to turn into the gigantic agencies that we used to work at, where the production gets so far removed from leadership that things just get lost. The people who you talk to are the same people that work on your project. Being fiercely independent and also extremely collaborative is also how we like to operate.”
House of Giants
3839 Jackson Street, Denver, CO
303-219-0697
