Pod1 Blog

Working within the world of fast fashion means that we don’t always have the opportunity of flexing our usability muscles on some of the ecommerce websites that come out of our well oiled machine. So when I came across this little gem, it urged me to start this new series of posts of sites that put the user at the heart of the website.

1. Nabru: they sell sofas

- Loving the mega top-nav drop-down

- BIG buttons and BIG words make me and my grandmother so happy

- Visual checkout

http://www.nabru.co.uk

Good work fellas.

1. Homepage takeover of VIMEO that is pretty outstanding. Great execution. It goes from this:

To this:

(originally found here: http://www.andykinsella.com/2010/03/02/tostitos-salsa-nice-takeover-example-on-vimeo/)

2. Skinput: using the skin on your arm instead of a joystick/keyboard – see for yourself:

We’re happy to announce the launch of Chic Outlet Shopping the latest phase of our work with Value Retail, owner of 9 designer outlet villages around Europe.

The launch of Chic Outlet Shopping finally ties the whole group of 10 sites together with a portal that will act as the gateway for the organisation’s international visitors.

Available in 11 languages, the site will be the primary destination for shoppers who want to visit one of the nine villages.

Main features of the site include descriptions of the nine villages and the discounted brands available at each destination; various guides and competitions; travel information and details of the various memberships available to shoppers.

When a site visitor wants to access any of the nine villages, it’s simply a click away.

The 10 sites have been developed using Epifony, Pod1’s proprietary open source Content Management System (which is based on the Symfony web application framework).

Click below to visit one of the sites:

Chic Outlet Shopping
Bicester Village
Kildare Village
Maasmechelen Village
Ingolstadt Village
Wertheim Village
Las Rozas Village
La Vallée Village
La Roca Village
Fidenza Village

I’m presenting at Figaro Digital’s ecommerce seminar next Wednesday 27th January at the Hospital Club in Covent Garden. There are only 50 places available for brand marketers so if you’re keen, book your place asap:

We’re happy to announce that Pod1 has been appointed by women’s wear fashion house LK Bennett to redesign its new e-commerce website.

Founded by Linda Bennett in 1990, LK Bennett has become well known for its signature accessory collections and sophisticated clothing. The L.K.Bennett brand philosophy centres on beautiful tailoring, elegant dresses and a universe of style and refinement. Today, under a new creative direction and an in-house design team, L.K.Bennett continues to expand its vision dedicated to femininity and glamour, to meet the lifestyle and requirements of every modern woman.

It first launched a site in 2007 and in that time has experienced considerable growth, making it necessary for the retailer to create a new online platform that could cope with a large user base. The retailer has selected Hybris as their new ecommerce platform (Portaltech to implement), with Pod1 to provide the design and user experience services.

Pod1 is working closely with LK Bennett to create the look and feel for the new site, ensuring that it recreates the in-store experience, with its attention to detail and high quality service.

The site is due to go live at the end of January.

As a follow-up to my previous post about social shopping, I came across this example of another decent social shopping tool on US fashion site Charlotte Russe.

To activate, you first need to invite a friend through the bottom panel labelled ‘CR’:

In it’s most basic form, it brings up an IM widget that allows you to chat with friends and send links of the pages you’re on through it’s ’send my item’ link:

I really believe that with some improvements to the user experience, this could be a big thing in ecommerce. I think there are some particularly strong cases for its use across the fashion segment and might even be the killer app (or something like it) that finally gets guys to shop online with confidence, knowing their partners have approved the purchase!

The company behind this particular example is called Decision Step.

http://www.legoclick.com

This was a piece that I recently wrote on multi-channel marketing for Marketing Week:

“Retailers have realised that having an online presence is not just a ‘nice to have’ but also an essential in today’s world. At the start of this century all retailers wanted to do was build a brand website and make sure it worked. Then came Ecommerce 1.0 – being able to sell online no matter what the user journey.”

Read the full article here

Today saw the launch of our latest and greatest, a lush website for the luxury 5 star Sani Resort.

Built using Epifony, our in-house Content Management System, the new site is home to 4 hotels: Sani Beach Hotel, Sani Beach Club, Porto Sani Village and Sani Asterias Suites.

Designed to give the visitor and enhanced user experience, and to provide that extra layer of information that’s essential to someone looking to book a family holiday at this luxury resort in Greece.

We’re pretty chuffed with the result. Let us know what you think.