Customization of Shopify has always been something I’ve wanted Talking Pixels to get it’s teeth into, and finally we have! Website to follow shortly, but here are some thoughts that the process has triggered…

Talking Pixels have always excelled at, and enjoyed, building custom e-commerce sites (particularly since Ruby on Rails came along). However, I’ve always been concerned about the large investment involved in building a really good e-commerce site from scratch, even with Rails. It’s fine for businesses who already have a reliable turnover, where the cost of building a solution from scratch is offset by the value of having features built around their (often rapidly changing) business needs. However, many e-commerce business ideas are more experimental, unpredictable, and started on a shoe-string. While in theory the web is ideal for this, the realisation of such ideas is often, let’s just say - ‘underwhelming’.

Trying out a business idea in the real world (well, real-virtual at least), while not having to invest large sums of time and money into software, is liberating, democratic and exciting. The idea that start-ups could be selling products to the world in a matter of days, even hours, through a professional looking and operating web shop,
is a revolution.

Services like Shopify allows business to try the market, selling real products, without busting the bank in the process. I’m sure market research still has it’s place, however, when the cost of deployment is so low, I have to wonder whether it still has such importance.

Of course, the idea behind Shopify isn’t new. In the dotcom days, I was involved in the development of a conceptually similar service for a UK-based payment processor. However, three things were wrong, in my opinion - firstly, the market wasn’t ready for it. Not enough people ‘got’ e-commerce. Secondly, web interfaces were rudimentary and painfully slow to use. The customisation options were either highly limited, badly designed or both. Thirdly, online marketing was a just a nipper. Tools such as Google Adwords and Campaign Monitor didn’t exist. And even if they had, few people would have grasped their potential.

I still believe customized solutions are the way forward, if you have capital to invest and a tried and tested business model. But services like Shopify are very usable for retailers who are just getting started.

So, I’ll end on a plug - if you’re looking for a customized Shopify site and you like the look of our work, we’d love to help. If you have grown out of your shopping cart, we’d also love
to help  : )

Btw. we’re based in Clerkenwell / Farringdon, London, UK.

We’re excited to announce the launch of our first self-initiated project - Talks & Lectures For Londoners. The concept is simple - a site which provides a comprehensive, up-to-date and highly searchable listing of the large number of talks and lectures happening in the London area.

Visit the site at: talks.forlondoners.com

It’s still very much a beta site - currently with events only from the ICA, RSA and LSE. The list should grow quickly, but hopefully it’s already a useful resource.

We’d love to hear your feedback on the site. Please do send any to:
feedback@forlondoners.com

We’re proud to announce the launch of a new e-commerce site for Elias & Grace, a boutique in Primrose Hill, London, selling designer maternity and children’s clothes.

www.eliasandgrace.com

The site is the fruits of what I consider to be a great working relationship between Elias & Grace, Aloof and ourselves. It has been designed and developed over the last few months, and despite the apparent simplicity of the end result, the process threw up some interesting design and technical challenges.

We look forward to hearing feedback from users about the site, seeing how Elias & Grace find the process of becoming an online retailer and working out how the site can continue to evolve.

A graphic designer and I had a discussion yesterday about adding a small piece of functionality to a site we are building together. I mocked up the elements and asked for some feedback. I was thinking along the lines of - ‘is this approach worth developing further?’. The designer’s response was along the lines of - ‘can you line A up with B, and C up with D?’. I said - ’sure, but do you think this is a good solution?’

This highlighted something interesting - i was thinking in terms of time and he was thinking about space. What i mean by that is that my

interests lay in the sequence of events that occurs between the user and the interface over a period of time; whereas his lay in the more static visual relationships between items on the page.

It was a reminder to me of how crucial it is to consider both of these factors to achieve successful interface design.