Cornerstone’s expertise keeping market-leading Digital Projection in its rightful position
A digital imaging pioneer and industry leader, Digital Projection manufactures and distributes an extensive and expanding array of ultra-high-performance projection systems across the world.
These projectors are the benchmark for demanding applications such as large-venue, live-event staging, education, medical and scientific research applications, command and control centres, digital signage and cinema, commercial entertainment, houses of worship and elite residential entertainment.
Digital Projection was formed in 1987 and is renowned for its instrumental role in developing new technologies pushing its sector’s boundaries.
The Manchester-based organisation was the first to market with 8k laser technology, first to market with a new satellite system, and often first to market with new applications and integrations for events and attractions worldwide – innovation and expertise that has garnered the business multiple awards and huge respect in equal measure.
So, when the time came for Digital Projection to update its ageing website, it was gratifying to see the best choosing the best to work on this project.
Digital Projection wanted a new website that reflected its prestigious brand position.
The demands of the new site were multi-layered. It had to be easier to manage and control, multi-lingual, integrated with back office systems and databases, SEO-friendly and more flexible for its marketing teams to edit and develop.
But first, we had to navigate a competitive tendering process from which our proposal and solution were selected as providing the strongest and most effective outcomes, some of which were down to our in-depth process of extracting market information, customer insights and customer journeys.
The website being replaced was built on WordPress and Digital Projection wanted to remain on that platform – no surprise given that approaching half of all websites on the internet are built on WordPress – a figure which continues to rise consistently.
WordPress can be updated with minimal fuss, ranks well in Google, and means you don’t have to contend with any of the coding complexities of a HTML-based site.
It contains plug-in architecture and a template system, that can be customised to create endless possibilities with thousands of free and premium plug-ins that can be used to extend a website’s functionality.
Here at Cornerstone, we don’t just ‘do’ WordPress development, we truly live and breathe it.
We launched the project with a full analytics review to understand Digital Projection’s current market position and to identify any opportunities and gaps within the market that could be exploited.
With this data, coupled with competitor benchmarking in place, our team of WordPress experts set out on our user experience (UX) process, which involved a workshop delivered across the UK, US and Europe to glean much-needed insights into the best structure to be delivered for Digital Projection to maintain its eminent position in the industry.
From here, our team worked up wireframes, UX strategy, customer personas, information architecture and site structure, all aligning with user journeys, corporate goals and objectives, and data and analytics insights.
As a full-service agency we have all the expertise required for a prestigious project of this nature under one roof, and with satisfaction high with the work we delivered, we moved the approved wires into our design studio for brand application and positioning work.
Both mobile and desktop views were carefully crafted to meet the client’s required brand positioning and criteria, which were signed off quickly in anticipation for our web team to start the website development.
This began with the development of the core CMS (content management system) structure and front end view, which was later coupled with internal databases that powered specification sheets and product documentation from a central repository, as well as integration into back office systems such as Sales Force and Marketo.
A unique and highly bespoke customer portal was developed for US visitors, allowing customers access to various supporting documentation and product knowledge intelligence, specific to each customer and application.
We developed the site using a bespoke build WordPress CMS, which used Gutenberg’s flexible block editor. This means Digital Protection can re-use and re-purpose blocks anywhere on the site, giving them total control and flexibility, thus fulfilling the brief for the site to be more flexible for its marketing teams to edit and develop.
Our team also developed a number of custom PHP scripts – a general-purpose scripting language that can be utilised to create intuitive and dynamic websites – to handle and manage connections to third party databases and Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), in order to ensure the safe and efficient transfer of data to and from the website.
And we undertook detailed Google Tag Manager work to ensure we captured key goals, conversions, and web events throughout all languages across the site, as well as the launch of a content distribution network (CDN) which delivers faster site speeds in all countries by serving them out from localised servers, whilst bringing additional security benefits.
Once completed, the site was handed over to Digital Projection for content entry following a training session on how to use the site and best practices.
It was then signed off and sent back to our development team for launch, which involved carefully handling over 6,000 global site redirects, vetting live versions of the site across multiple VPNs and setting up a complex language access protocol, allowing visitors from different territories access to certain areas of the site.
The project successfully launched in late 2022, ready for a series of trade exhibitions and shows such as the Integrated Systems Europe (ISE) expo in Barcelona, where its presence is always highly anticipated for showcasing its class leading, high-end projection products and technologies.
If you would like our expert WordPress team to enhance your business or organisation, get in touch for a friendly, informative chat.
Whether it’s a landing page or a full e-commerce site, an online learning academy or an interactive informational site for your business or organisation, we can build it for you.
