Alpha Multimedia Solutions

CompView had outgrown its website. With a glut of project installations, a vast array of content, and a broadened audience, they faced the issue of having expanded at a rate that their old site couldn’t handle. They needed to present themselves as the powerhouse they’d become, so they approached Alpha for an extensive redesign that would elevate their website up to the caliber of service they delivered.

Alpha began by identifying CompView’s target audience and produced use cases along with streamlined Information Architecture. These use cases were essential to the restructuring because they helped to identify how CompView’s target audience would interact with the site, and what specific information potential clients would look for.

After extensive surveying, Alpha became convinced that CompView needed to pare down the focus of their website in order to produce a succinct user experience. They agreed, and we built the site with a emphasis on two primary demographics, while CompView augmented their off-site marketing in order to reach their enormous client pool.

CompView’s web administration staff was looking for a simple way to update site content without using Dreamweaver or FTP. Keeping this in mind, we created a custom content management system (CMS) that enabled them to both modify text, manage their case study gallery, oversee their product inventory, and upload supporting documents. It was also necessary for the site to integrate with Infocommiq, a third-party product catalog vendor used in the electronics industry. We were able to achieve these goals with updated and unique application architecture.

Search Engine Optimization played a special role in our design of the CompView site. The top navigation needed to be flexible enough to accommodate the often verbose SEO navigation title, while also having a design that could store several copy-heavy content buckets. The CompView content allowed us to identify target words and phrases early in the project, which helped to guide us as we rewrote the copy. Each of our content types needed to support meta-data as we reached the application phase, both page content and module types. Most of the meta-data was managed via the CompView custom CMS, but some of the higher-level meta-data needed to be stored in a configuration file for performance purposes.

We were lucky to start with a company who had the happy predicament of outgrowing its previous website. By working with laser-precise focus we were able to identify the inimitable and necessary traits that would keep CompView a dominant force in the A/V field.

What was the most challenging aspect of the project?
After initial surveys with the staff at CompView, the target audience was exceedingly broad, and they were clear that the site needed to address each of these distinct user groups. Our initial discoveries involved us creating several user funnels that would have to translate into a succinct user experience. However, after further research, we realized that we could not accommodate every user group and recommended that we only target the top two demographics which would allow us to focus on a tighter Information Architecture and design. The client agreed, and internally, it forced them to refocus their off-site marketing.

What were some of the specific features that the client requested?
Although the web administration staff are web savvy, they were looking for a simple way to update content on their site without using Dreamweaver and FTP. We created a custom content management system that enabled them to not only modify text on the site, but also manage their case study gallery, product inventory and upload supporting documents as well. The site also had to integrate with Infocommiq – a third party product catalog vendor used in the electronics industry. This was accomplished through the application architecture.

How did Search Engine Optimization influence your design and application architecture?
Heavily. We used an external SEO consultant and engaged him early in the process. The content was available early in the project, so it allowed us to quickly identify key words and phrases that we should be targeting and involved a fair amount of the content to be rewritten. From a design perspective, this influenced the top navigation as it had to be flexible enough to accommodate the often verbose SEO navigation title. Additional, the design had to have accommodate for several content buckets, that would contain further copy. From an application standpoint, we had to design each of our content types to support meta-data, whether it was a page content type or a module. Some of the meta-data was managed via the custom CMS, but some of the higher level meta-data was stored in a configuration file (for performance purposes).