WordPress website design technology company

Sumitomo Electric Lightwave

Overview

As a website design + development company, Atlantic BT knows that user experience (UX) is just as important as a website’s functionality. Research firm Forrester confirms this in a 2016 study where they found that every $1 invested in UX results in a return of $100. Sumitomo Electric Lightwave didn’t need convincing. They knew they had a problem with their WordPress website design when even their own installation technicians had trouble finding the product information they needed.

Project Type

Custom Website

Technology

WordPress

Industry

B2B

Our Process

Company Overview

Sumitomo Electric Lightwave (SEL) is an industry leader in next generation optical fiber. From the very day they opened their doors in 1983, they knew that an all optical fiber network was the wave of the future. SEL is a wholly owned privately-held company of Sumitomo Electric Industries (SEI) – the only optical fiber and cable manufacturer on the global Fortune 500 Company list.

Sumitomo before and after WordPress website design work

The Ask

Rapidly growing from a $200 million to a $1 billion company, SEL’s website wasn’t keeping up. Their technicians could not easily access vital data needed while on job sites and the company’s product information was not searchable within the site’s search engine. The overall design was dated and not mobile-friendly. Most troubling was the complexity of their product catalog as users were unable to locate the products they were interested in purchasing. Sumitomo Electric Lightwave needed to improve their website with a new WordPress website design.

Our WordPress Website Design Process

Discovery

Major usability issues also meant major opportunities for improving the user experience. To understand the issues, we conducted stakeholder and user interviews. Then we reorganized the products and site navigation through taxonomy and information architecture workshops.

Design

We revamped the look and feel of the website to reflect the cutting edge technology that Sumitomo Electric Lightwave sells. We designed a new mega menu to reduce the number of clicks required for technicians and customers to find a product.

Development

The WordPress search feature was improved by adding filtering capabilities and a categorized video library. A new Hubspot plugin was added to allow SEL to integrate customer and product data between the website and CRM system. These changes, plus a WooCommerce plugin addition, would majorly improve the user’s experience when shopping SEL’s products online. Gutenberg blocks were also added to allow SEL to easily update their content internally.

The End Result

With a revamped WordPress website design from Atlantic BT, Sumitomo Electric Lightwave now has a digital presence that is as fierce as their presence in the optical fiber industry. The WordPress website design has an improved search feature, which also doubles as a support center. This provides quick access to crucial product information for the company’s engineers, contractors, and potential clients. With a new mobile-friendly design, SEL’s technicians are now able to quickly access product info and how-to videos while on job sites, meaning faster turnaround times for their customers. The success of SEL’s site improvements led to an additional partnership with the company’s European division.