ERP for a Flower Delivery Business
About
the
customer
All of our customers are pretty successful in growing their companies, mixing cutting-edge technologies with passion and a business-centric mindset. However, this case study and the story behind it deserve special attention.
Getting started with a simple website, our customer's company has grown from a small business to a medium-side one with a well-developed physical presence in their homeland cities. We are proud to contribute to our customer's success, so here is how thing were going.
Initial request
Our customer owns a flower delivery business, and we have been partnering with this company for seven years already. The customer reached out to us in response to our ad for the first time, filled in the contact form, and requested us to create a simple eCommerce website for ordering flowers and bouquets.
Pre-sale stage
After analyzing the customer's business, its specifics, and the actual needs behind their request, we concluded that in addition to the website, the company misses a perfectly-tailored Enterprise Resource Planning system to keep all the issues under control and better achieve their business goals. As a result, we have developed a proposal explaining the business value of running an eCommerce website strengthened by an ERP, and the customer was excited by this opportunity.
After achieving a complete agreement, we decided to move on in milestones. At the first stage, we were going to create a responsive website with a simple but intelligent ordering system. At the second step, we were planning to move to ERP development.
Team composition
We shortlisted the most winning technologies relevant at the moment of the website development (seven years ago) - Codeigniter, Twitter Bootstrap, Google Analytics, jQuery, and Yandex.Metrika. To make the project development cost-effective and streamlined, we decided to staff the team with two developers and a Project Manager. The customer entrusted the choice of the tools and the necessary specialist entirely, so after deciding on the communication, reporting, and control channels, we proceeded to the website's technical creation.
Development
Our development process took place in two stages. Step by step, the project scope was growing, and we responded to this need by suggesting more advanced technologies and staffing the team with the necessary tech experts.
ECommerce website development
This core function allows the users to quickly find what they need, using either the search bar or being guided by the search filters.
The customer had a pretty wide range of flowers and complimentary items (packaging, decorations, and so on), so we have developed a detailed system of search filters to let the customers quickly stuff their orders with all the necessary items.
We also embedded the website with a catalog with an opportunity to describe each of the items in detail and adding several photos.
The ordering system is one more core feature of any eCommerce website, so for our customers, we made it intuitive and effective, plus ensured the safe checkout process.
With its help, the customers can ask their questions and get instant support.
We also did our best to make the mobile version as mobile-friendly as possible to let the customer stay in touch with the mobile-first customer and reduce the mobile bounce rate to as minimal a figure as possible.
SEO promotion is crucial for eCommerce websites - this is one more reason to be double-careful with the tech stack choice at the very beginning and keep the code clear. We made sure the website of our customers is technically powerful to drive good SEO results.
This feature was the next step in our customer's website evolution. With its help, the users could get a full-fledged eCommerce experience by ordering everything they need and getting their orders delivered at a predictable cost.
In response to the growing customers' needs, we connected several payment systems via APIs to let the customer finalize the deal safely.
As a part of their marketing strategy, the customer launched promo campaigns on the eve of the holidays. That's why we have added several features to change the design elements quickly, add advertising banners, and better grab the users' attention.
Custom ERP system development
management
The customer had many product items, and most of the items also had a lot of add-ons. We have created an inventory management dashboard to control and manage the items in stock, preventing the business from running out of it.
management
Each item was priced differently, so keeping track of prices was one more task the ERP system should be able to cope with. The in-built price management features made it possible to develop a pricing algorithm depending on market conditions.
management
We also powered an ERP system with an intelligent shipping cost calculation algorithm. It helped to suggest the correct shipping cost depending on the order volume, size, weight, and shipment destination.
management
Developing a website and an ERP system was the first step towards our customer's business growth. They opened several flower stores in different cities, and in response to the growing business needs, we have added the features to control the processes in each of the points of sale.
delivery
As the logical continuation of the previous feature, we also strengthened an ERP system with the opportunity to manage product delivery to the different cities, according to the shipment methods chosen by the website user.
feature
At this stage, we suggested making the ultimate use out of the data the website generated. For this purpose, we connected the website to Google Analytics and Yandex Metrica. We set up data transfer from the third-party analytical platforms to the customer's ERP system.
for employees
While the website visitors expected their orders to be handled asap since most of them ordered flowers for special occasions, we also added push and SMS notifications for employees to keep them updated on new orders. The employees also become able to transfer the customers' data into an ERP, plus each of the orders and data layers gained an access level.
Results &
business value
Our customer shared that developing an ERP system allowed them to speed up their business processes twice a time. The website we created for them was a starting point in their business growth, and the combination of the efforts helped their company grow from a tiny business to a medium-sized one.
Client feedback
We were astonished by the professional level of IT Master Soft team.
They have one of the highest levels of customer focus and expertise, both technical and business, that I’ve ever seen.
We really like the attitude of the team to our business in general and to us as a client in particular.