Founders Formula

Ann had commissioned a website audit of Founders Formula. It came as a slide deck and a recorded video walkthrough, and the conversion recommendations sat between the 10 and 18 minute marks. She wanted all of them implemented, not just a selection.

She first split the work into four stages: the homepage and navigation, category and product pages with rewards, cart and checkout, and a final review. Two days in, she merged them into two milestones. The first covered the homepage, navigation, fonts and colours. The second was a post-review to make sure every point in the audit had been done.

Ann works from a list, and she wanted every point on it done. Some of the points were design changes. Others involved apps or data, or asked for things Shopify doesn't allow. Part of the job was telling her clearly which points we could deliver and which needed something else.

The store also runs a wholesale channel through Samita Wholesale B2B, a third-party app. Stockists log in to see trade prices. Partway through the project a stockist reported that she could only see retail prices. A few days later wholesale pricing stopped working for every account, while stockists were waiting to place orders. On top of that, logged-out visitors could see wholesale-only products listed as size options, when they should only have seen the 3 x 50g moisturisers.

• 01 A new homepage, navigation, fonts and colours We rebuilt the homepage and navigation using the audit recommendations and updated the store's fonts and colours. Milestone 1 went to Ann on 29 August, three days before it was due, and she approved it the same afternoon.
• 02 An awards section Ann shared a folder of the brand's awards. We built an awards section from her reference so shoppers see them as they scroll, which gives the brand more credibility.
• 03 Product and category improvements We added an Exfoliators block to the homepage and a Recently Viewed section on the product page. The side cart already recommends similar products, so we left it alone and didn't add a second, competing row.
• 04 Search that suggests products We added popular searches to the search bar. Ann can choose which collection feeds the suggestions, so she can create a collection of best sellers and update it herself. We also sent her a direct link to the search settings in the theme editor.
• 05 A rewards link in the header We added a rewards link to the header. It opens the rewards popup, so customers can find the programme from any page.
• 06 Wholesale pricing restored the same day For the first stockist, we checked that her customer tag was right and sent a password reset. When pricing failed for every account, we went through the app configuration and raised a ticket with Samita. Following their instructions, we added the search file their app needs in the theme. Wholesale pricing worked again the same afternoon, and logged-out visitors stopped seeing wholesale-only products.
• 07 A clear list of what the audit needed beyond the theme Three audit points couldn't be done through the theme. Skin type filters depend on the data entered on each product. Showing rewards points needs custom code because the rewards app doesn't include it. Checkout design is restricted by Shopify and would need a checkout extension. We explained each one to Ann so she could decide what to do next.