Case Study · eCommerce & Growth Marketing
Turning a product catalog into a revenue engine
RectorSeal, a $750M manufacturer and a house of 126 brands, sold mostly offline, and its website was built for the company, not the customer. I owned the eCommerce channel and the website, built the team from one person to ten, and over three years grew the channel from $7M to more than $50M.
The results
The challenge
A website built for the company, not the customer
When I arrived, only a small share of customers bought online and conversion sat near half a percent. Customers could not search the way they shopped. To find a product they had to know its exact part number or the name the company used for it internally.
The site was full of internal jargon, and the categories mirrored how the company's systems were organized rather than how a customer would browse. Product and email content talked about what interested the company, not what mattered to the buyer.
There was no value proposition anywhere. Nothing told a customer why a product was worth buying, how it saved time, made the job easier, or beat the competition. And there was almost no team: one web administrator and an outside development agency.
The approach
Rebuilding the experience around how customers buy
Replaced jargon with the customer's words
I learned how customers describe what they need from technical support and customer service, then A/B tested their words against the company's. The company worried plain language would look unprofessional, so I asked for one test. Customer language won, and it kept winning, which built the case for an experimentation program and a full rebuild of navigation and categories around how customers use the products.
Made products findable
I integrated Algolia so search became forgiving and AI driven. Customers could find products the way they naturally searched, instead of needing an exact part number. The same engine recommended related products based on what customers did on the site.
Redesigned the product pages
The information customers need first (part number, availability and price) now comes first. Below it: benefits, a clear value proposition for each brand, and a closing case for buying from RectorSeal.
Cut checkout from 30 minutes to 14
Session recordings showed where buyers struggled. Cross sell prompts at checkout were sending people back into search, so I moved them to the product page. With logistics and customer service, I removed fields business buyers didn't need, let them split an order across delivery locations, and showed shipping costs during checkout.
Launched a procurement platform customers work in
I was the product and project manager for SaaS our business customers used to run their own procurement: quotes, a configurator for custom products, purchase order lookup across three years, bulk and reorder lists, and an orders dashboard.
I interviewed customers to learn what they needed, led the UX and UI, and held engagement targets, not just sales targets. Email and webinars brought customers in. Customer service inquiries fell 80%.
Launched every new product on its real advantage
I owned new product releases and their go to market message, with the product marketing managers. I added competitor review to every launch: compare the product with what competes with it, find its real advantage, and show why the product, the brand and the company are the better choice. Each audience got its own message, and the release, the landing page and the email told one story.
Turned webinars into a path to sales
I made the case for a real webinar platform over the tool the company already licensed, because ours could segment and track. Registrants told us their role, so customers, prospects and influencers each got their own journey, and the experts running each session handed interested people to the right sales team.
Registrations grew six times, attendance rose about 60%, and 80% of attendees signed up for the next session we recommended.
Built the cross sell engine with sales
With the VP of Sales, I piloted automation that reads what each account already buys and recommends the next product, on the account record, the site, email and in store. The pilot lifted basket size 15%, and the engine projected $181M in incremental pipeline over two years.
The team
From one person to ten, one pilot at a time
I started with one web administrator and an outside agency. Within weeks a business case moved the agency budget to an in house developer, for speed and customization. The web administrator was curious about SEO, so I coached him into the team's SEO specialist as organic visits grew from 40,000 to 150,000 a month.
A freelance print designer grew into our full time UX and UI designer. As CRM and automation came online, we added a HubSpot and lifecycle manager, developers and data roles.
To keep many teams aligned, I introduced agile: every request scored on impact and sized, on a 16 month roadmap anyone could see, with a monthly review open to the whole company.
The through line: I run the website like a sales channel, and I build it with the people who know the customer best. Every change made it easier for customers to find what they needed and buy it.