Why Magento?
With its expansive feature set and unparalleled flexibility, Magento was a natural choice to use as an eCommerce platform. It provides many of the features desired by Hype DC out of the box, with enhancements and customisations developed by Fontis to go beyond a standard Magento system and make Hype DC something truly special. Magento features, such as layered navigation, configurable products, sorting, stock management, custom attributes, search and onepage checkout have been modified to enhance usability for the customer and allow them to find what they want faster and more easily.
Business Expansion
Traditionally operating as bricks and mortar stores only, Hype DC are now utilising a multi-channel retail approach, which has helped reach new customers across the country and convenience for existing customers. With enhanced marketing channels and tools, such as in-store brochures and e-mail newsletters, online and offline stores provide expanded cross-channel promotion and boost traffic and business to both their physical stores and the online counterpart.
None of this would be possible without comprehensive software integration between the existing supply chain management solution and Magento. Fontis provided extensions to allow for automated order and product synchronisation between the two systems, ensuring effective stock management. An extension was also used to synchronise newsletter subscribers with their selected email marketing tool.
Social Interaction
Online retailers are increasingly turning to social media and networks to increase brand awareness by word of mouth, empower public relations by reaching into niche markets and allow for customer interaction at a more personal level. Hype DC is no exception, and leverages a number of Web 2.0 services on the website. Examples include allowing customers to post products to social bookmarking sites, such as Facebook and Digg, providing fresh content through an integrated blog, and automatically posting new products on Twitter.
All these techniques form part of a multi-faceted approach to increasing user participation on the site, leading to higher numbers of return visitors and greater customer retention.
Results
The new Hype DC website has been enthusiastically received, with both brands and customers commenting on the excellent presentation and ease of use. This positive feedback has been reflected through strong sales and traffic, which also drives customers into the traditional retail stores.
Partnered with Fontis, Hype DC continues to improve and build upon the Magento eCommerce platform, and will further cement their place as a unique and innovative Australian retailer in both the online and offline spaces.
