Hedges Direct
The UK’s leading supplier of hedging plants, available nationally by ordering online or by phone, since 2006
Background
We’ve provided Hedges Direct with their ecommerce solutions for over a decade, supporting them to achieve their growth plans. During this time, Hedges Direct has grown its sales by more than tenfold. As they’ve expanded, our relationship with them has morphed to ensure our service matches their requirements.
Hedges Direct understands its industry in great depth and we’ve designed specific features to maximise the browser experience and increase conversion rates. Their industry knowledge is exemplary, and paired with their customer centric strategy, they have created an incredibly successful ecommerce business.
The Brief
Hedges Direct have entrusted us to maintain their site, implementing updates and proposing modern developments to support the growth of their business. The standard ecommerce template was not sufficient for their business model as it did not suit their requirements. Building a suitable template required problem solving and innovation to ensure we identified the most effective way of displaying their products and upselling effectively.
Hedges Direct requested the following:
- Easy navigation – Additional navigation to help users identify products. The similar imagery can easily confuse customers and make it challenging to differentiate between plants.
- Smart product recommendations – technology to identify suitable products for users where possible using browser cookie data.
- Product management tools – software to support them with their products and order details, such as mass product description updates.
- Basket optimisation – as a final stage of a purchaser’s journey, Hedges Direct saw great value in optimising the basket area. They requested an option to upsell planting essentials and encourage sales with a dynamic message, calculating the remaining spend required to meet the free delivery threshold.
Their passionate approach made it easy for us
Hedges Direct’s passionate and enthusiastic approach provided us with a fantastic springboard to manage and maintain their website over the years. We’ve completed many developments, including advanced product navigation, browser optimisation, upselling / product recommendation features, dynamic messaging and much more. You can find out more about these specific features in the section below.
Before Sellerdeck we constantly had problems, since then we no longer worry about issues or spend time with support fixing them. It was a great decision to upgrade as the site is now extremely stable which gives us confidence in it and saves a lot of time and hassle.
Special Features
Enhanced Navigation
Mobile Content Optimisation
Customised Product Presentation
Page Load Speed
International
Integration
Multiple products per page
Listing all species on the same product for easy navigation
Hedges Direct sells about 80 different species of plant. Plants are available in different sizes, with varying root treatments (bare-root, pot, root ball), but the final plants will look the same, so species images and descriptions will be the same. Therefore each section for a species contains a Species Product with species information, followed by multiple individual products, one for each possible size and root type currently available. The species product doesn’t have a separate product page, but all individual products do.
The Section page doesn’t just list all products in the section normally. It shows the details of the Species Product in the section, then loops over all the normal products in the section and creates a simple summary HTML for a list of products. This shows key information about root type, plant size, and an add to cart button.
So when a customer lands on a species section (or “species page”), they get information about the species with photos of how it will look when mature, and they can see a list of sizes to buy.
Different product options for all browsers
When a Species page is loaded, there may be many versions of the species available – a combination of 4 different root types and many different sizes. However, depending on season and customer, they may strongly prefer the root type. Someone with a bit more cash to spare and little time will be looking for an instant hedge in a trough. Another may be looking for a bare root bargain.
Therefore, when the species page is loaded, some JavaScript works out what sorts of root types are available; and looks for an indicator for the customer’s preference. This might be set in a cookie or parameter to the page URL. The JavaScript shows products that match the selected root type, and hides the others. Clicking a root type selector will change the set of displayed products. Another selection is made between individual and bulk (palleted) products.
This simplifies the many different combinations of plants that are available for a given species, making it easier for customers to find the plant that fits their requirements.
Planting essentials in the cart are calculated dynamically from the cart contents
Hedges Direct also needs to upsell “Planting Essential” items like Rootgrow, which boosts plants’ root systems and is particularly beneficial for bare-root products. The amount of Rootgrow required depends on the number of bare root plants purchased.
Fertiliser is another product which depends on the order. Upselling isn’t possible on the product page as the customer may add multiple plants, all needing the same Planting Essential product. The only place it can be calculated is in the cart.
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