Impact Story – Biopac
A Mission-Driven Website for Global Impact
BIOPAC is a leading developer of life sciences tools. Since 1985, they have served R&D efforts in educational institutions, healthcare facilities, and research labs all over the world.
In 2014 they came to NDIC to help them bring their business into the digital age.
Understanding the Challenge
BIOPAC’s mission is to “develop innovative, high quality, competitively priced life sciences educational and research hardware and software designed to meet customers’ needs.”
When we met, BIOPAC had already attempted to build an eCommerce solution but was on a proprietary platform that was based on old technology and was costly to upgrade. We identified that the primary goal was to build a solution that addressed their users needs, enhanced the User Experience (UX), and provided a clear upgrade path over time so they could retain their investment in their website. With thousands of web pages and hundreds of products, the task of exporting content from a legacy platform, reorganizing and migrating it all to a WordPress instance using a custom NDIC theme was the first order of business.
Improving the UX
BIOPAC has a vast library of resources, and specific information needed to be found easily. With exacting site architecture, an elegant megamenu, and sophisticated use of WordPress functionality, we instituted a User Experience that is intuitive and simple as one navigates through a complex set of data.
To further enhance the UX, we implemented a natural language search tool. EasyAsk search not only understands errors in typing and spelling, but can recommend associated items with the search results. The resulting UX, for a site with 9 primary categories and thousands of pages of content, has impacted the overall use of the site tremendously, improving the stickiness of the site over 50% while reducing the number of clicks per user. People are getting to what they need quicker and staying longer!
Streamlining BIOPAC’s RFQ Process
BIOPAC wanted a tailored request for quote process to streamline inquiries that was designed to handle requests and directly funnel them to the correct sales person in the nearest country or region. This system allows BIOPAC a to provide detailed quotes to their clients efficiently and accurately, and without needing to manually route RFQs internally.
Easy-to-Understand Product Information with Helpful Articles
Understanding the importance of detailed and organized product information, we designed extensive product category and detail pages. These pages pull data from multiple custom post types, enabling seamless association of knowledge-based articles, downloads and video tutorials with products.
SEO is tremendously important for any website. BIOPAC already had excellent search rankings and it was critical that they retain those in the migration. We built a custom URL forwarding routine that enabled thousands of product and content URLs on the old site to seamlessly forward to the correct pages on the new site. In conjunction with their SEO agency, we monitored results and made numerous adjustments to reduce 404s and retain the SEO link juice that BIOPAC had achieved over many years.
Supporting BIOPAC’s Mission in Advancing Scientific Understanding
Through our collaboration, BIOPAC now has a robust, user-friendly website that effectively showcases their products and services. Their site supports their mission to provide their diverse client base with easy access to vital information and tools. Our ongoing support ensures that BIOPAC’s online presence remains strong and up-to-date, allowing them to focus on their core mission of advancing scientific understanding of the human body.
