QSD began as a supplier of stage curtains and theatrical supplies. Over the years they expanded into industrial curtains and gymnasium products, and now have an international reach with superior products and service.
Central to that has been their website with its emphasis on brochure-style descriptions and product catalogue listings. As with many businesses, this was accomplished by organic growth. New product lines were added, immediate promotional needs required a new nav item, and so on. Eventually, this bolt-on approach becomes unwieldy and organizational structure suffers because of it. This reached its climax with the addition of a product catalogue system which fractured product description and product listing into two separate areas. A solution was provided without addressing the underlying issue.
From the outset, we saw our task as to not merely produce an engaging design, but to strip the site back to its core and rebuild the back end from the ground up. We pulled down every page of content from this large site and focussed on site architecture instead of changing out the theme. Clicks which formerly required four levels to reach the information customers required were reduced to one or two. From there, we made incremental improvements to the interface elements.
We worked on the larger issue of separate product verticals and different customer bases as we provided QSD with their first major digital marketing campaign. Theatric, Industry and Athletic were given their own sub-logo and colour scheme and identified clearly-defined areas on the site. We wanted to avoid putting theatre curtains in front of a tradesman looking for a new welding booth.
The home page and social media ads were the first pieces to deliver this direction, leading to blog posts and landing pages which guided potential customers down the sales funnel with relevant information.
Through analytics we determined we reversed the downward trend on site visits and duration in 30 days, which exceeded our initial estimate of approximately 90 days to begin turning things around. While overall call and email volume decreased, the quality of lead and their likelihood to buy increased from an average of 15 warm leads a month to 200. The conclusion reached by IR and QSD was that the strategy had been effective: the site was now answering the basic questions it should provide and it enabled customers to move unimpeded down the sales funnel.
Reaching out to past and potential customers through email marketing we extended their reach across Canada. With a number of potential leads in Central Canada, consideration to open an office in the Toronto area began.
