March 2008
When MyPaperShop came to us, they needed a fresh design, and a way to ease their fulfillment and customer service workload. Their most immediate need was to switch from a proprietary shopping cart with their former host, to Miva Merchant. We moved them to Hostasaurus and migrated their existing cart to Miva Merchant 4.
Graphically, the existing site was hard on the eyes and hard to use. Full of dark colors and multi-level dropdown navigation, the site often sent customers scrambling...if not to a competitor, then they went to the phone. MyPaperShop.com's staff became quickly overwhelmed. In addition to taking phone orders, they also found themselves answering the same questions over and over.
We approached this set of problems by designing a new look and feel for MyPaperShop.com. The dark green site was replaced with a lighter design, in neutral colors with maroon and green accents, and a lot of whitespace to help customers handle the large quantity of information presented on each page. Standard wording and additional product details were placed throughout the site, including a reminder that items are sold only by the case, and product details such as case quantity and inner pack size.
We also introduced new tools to help customer self-service. An estimate shipping utility helps customers see when their order will arrive, and what the delivery costs will be. Quantity-based discounts were added, so that customers who needed to order lots of items could received a discount; this feature also nicely increased the average order size. Finally, a custom order tracking system allows customers to retrieve their order status and tracking numbers directly from the web site.
While implementing the new design, we kept a close eye on SEO tactics. The site is fully designed with CSS positioning, a technique that has replaced the use of tables for layout purposes, and which generally reduces the code-to-content ratio, a boon for SEO purposes. We also helped MyPaperShop.com identify areas where textual content could be added to the site to attract search engines.
We also used Merchant Optimizer to speed up the site, and for SEO purposes, to provide the shortest URLs possible.
To increase linkbaiting opportunities, we migrated content from an existing informational site into the main domain, since the informational site wasn't optimized for search engines. We also configured a link management program to assist MyPaperShop.com with their reciprocal link campaign.
Because Google loves weblogs, we integrated a Wordpress weblog into the site. We started by creating a custom Wordpress theme that matches the layout of the Miva Merchant pages exactly, down to the detail of pulling in the total amount of items in the cart. We then created a special Wordpress theme file that can be called from the site's Miva Merchant-generated homepage to display links to the 3 most recently-added posts. Finally, we helped MyPaperShop.com locate and hire a writer to generate content for the weblog. The weblog posts feature party-planning tips, and often link back to specific categories or products within the store.
"Since 2004, we have been working with the NetBlazon team and have been happy with the quality of work we received. They were very helpful with our new website design and have extensive knowledge of Miva Merchant e-commerce environment. Those using Miva Merchant should consider NetBlazon because of their comprehensive understanding of the Miva software.
- Todd Theodossin, President, My Paper Shop.Com, Inc.
