Emergent Software

Growth at The Tile Shop (TTS) meant it was time to upgrade both their internal systems and their digital marketing assets to streamline the business, expand brand awareness, and enhance the shopping experience for all their customers. A central tenant of this strategy was a complete redesign and re-platforming of their e-commerce website. TTS's vision for the project was to build a beautiful website on a modern platform with advanced marketing features and robust integration with their ERP system. The Tile Shop's leadership team engaged Emergent Software early on in the project so that Emergent could assist them with selecting the best available technology for their needs.

Sitecore was the ideal CMS to host the website The Tile Shop was looking for.

After assessing TTS's goals and long-term strategy around the website re-build, Emergent Software recommended a package consisting of Sitecore XP Version 8 for the Content Management System (CMS), Azure Cloud Services for hybrid cloud hosting, and WECO eCommerce for the website's cart functionality and SAP integration.

Of course, a project of this magnitude had to have a strict deadline, right? In order to deliver the website together with their SAP implementation, the website needed to be launched in six months! With a solid technology stack to work with and the deadline in place, Emergent Software wasted no time getting started. This was the perfect challenge for Emergent's agile development processes, where the focus of any project starts with building the foundational components of a solution and then adding key functionality on top of the foundation frequently until the client is ready to launch the system. 

Emergent Software worked with The Tile Shop's talented design team to refresh the look and feel of the website in a way that was feasible given the time constraints of the project. They tailor-built a hybrid cloud-based hosting package using Microsoft Azure that was sized perfectly to handle the website's traffic and integration needs. They also implemented Sitecore to make content management a breeze and trained The Tile Shop's team on how to use the tool effectively. Workflows were added to ensure a proper content governance process was being followed, and Emergent brought in Sitecore's Experience Accelerator team to train The Tile Shop on key advanced marketing features available to them with the new CMS. Emergent Software also built custom integrations to seamlessly pass information between SAP and the website as well as to tie into new and existing marketing tools.

A beautiful new site with an efficient turnaround.

The result of the team's work was a new website with a refreshed and consistent design, seamless integrations, advanced marketing capabilities, easy-to-manage-content, and this was all done in six months!

Emergent continues to work with The Tile Shop on a daily basis adding cool new features to the website to further establish it as the central hub for TTS's contractor partners, designers, and customers to collaborate on projects of all sizes. Emergent also continues to maintain and improve the website on an ongoing basis. The successful website re-build has established a long-term web development partnership for years to come.

The city of Minneapolis wanted a comprehensive plan that encouraged & supported community engagement. 

Cities like Minneapolis publish comprehensive plans to set the direction for their growth and development over the upcoming decades. In the past, Minneapolis' plans were released as a basic document, which ended up hindering community engagement. The city's leadership wanted to try something different this time around. They decided on a first-of-its-kind interactive city plan website to foster a healthy discussion between the city's leadership and its residents. 

Umbraco was the perfect CMS to publish a plan that everyone could access and interact with. 

Emergent Software, along with our design partner LN Design Co, helped the City of Minneapolis determine the best way to communicate their comprehensive plan through a website. Mobile-friendliness and accessibility were high priorities, as their main goal was to ensure all residents have the ability to collaborate with the city on its 2040 comprehensive plan. Residents would need to be able to comment on specific parts of the plan, which would be reviewed by the city as it modifies the plan based on feedback collected. 

A Content Management System (CMS) would be essential to the city's ability to regularly update the plan and create new website content in an organized fashion. We chose one of our favorite web development tools, Umbraco CMS, which allows us to tailor both the design of the website itself and the interface for the site's many content editors. 

A website accessible for all! 

We were excited that the city required an accessible website because we put a high value on accessibility with all websites we build. We developed the site to be easy to understand, navigate, and operate by users who require visual assistance, screen readers, or keyboard navigation. LN Design Co did a fantastic job of creating a visually attractive website that fits within WCAG 2.0 and ADA guidelines.