;transform: ;msFilter:;'%3E%3Cpath d='m20.487 17.14-4.065-3.696a1.001 1.001 0 0 0-1.391.043l-2.393 2.461c-.576-.11-1.734-.471-2.926-1.66-1.192-1.193-1.553-2.354-1.66-2.926l2.459-2.394a1 1 0 0 0 .043-1.391L6.859 3.513a1 1 0 0 0-1.391-.087l-2.17 1.861a1 1 0 0 0-.29.649c-.015.25-.301 6.172 4.291 10.766C11.305 20.707 16.323 21 17.705 21c.202 0 .326-.006.359-.008a.992.992 0 0 0 .648-.291l1.86-2.171a.997.997 0 0 0-.085-1.39z'%3E%3C/path%3E%3C/svg%3E)
CSSC
CSSC Sports & Leisure is a not-for-profit membership organisation, offering discounts, offers and active lifestyle support to over 140,000 civil service and public sector workers.
After coming to us with a broken, poorly performing website, we built them a new CMS and ecommerce solution, complete with a very sophisticated join process – all of which was integrated with their CRM, Microsoft Dynamics.
The new site, custom built to their exact requirements using Laravel, soon achieved:
200% increase in unique visitors
200% increase in page impressions
119% increase in online orders
“As per usual, they were absolutely phenomenal from start to finish. […] 18a were adaptable, supportive and always quick to respond to any queries we had […] creative, informative and extremely knowledgeable and played a huge part of the success of the campaign.”
Intelligent search
CSSC’s search allowed the admin team to prioritise the order of results, as well as operating around key objectives of what should feature most prominently. It was also built to provide the best user experience, by not bringing back unhelpful results because of misleading words which may have featured on pages. It clearly differentiated between different types of content, highlighted what savings were to be made, and integrated with various 3rd party platforms to bring back results. Later, we also integrated Algolia.
Flexible CMS
The crux of the site was an extensive CMS, which allowed CSSC to create pages, offers, articles and more, selecting from various colour themes to match the content to different sections of their offering. An extensive form builder allowed them to select how responses were gathered, and how those responses were then processed inhouse including automated weekly downloads being emailed to key personnel, whilst the custom built media library allowed the team to manage images and documents exactly how they requested.
Online shop
After extensive research, CSSC had concluded that nothing “off the shelf” would suit their ecommerce requirements, so we custom built them a shop that could do everything from generate QR codes for cinema tickets sold in conjunction with the Cineworld API, to limiting how many times a month members could purchase certain items. The site also generated extensive reports, which, being a not-for-profit membership organisation and therefore subsidising items sold, were quite non-standard!
Memberships
One of the most complex parts of the site was the extensive Join process. The requirements for joining CSSC needed to be checked extensively for each person trying to join, with an indepth CRM integration along with payment options including Direct Debit and card payments with Global Payments.
Autoscaling cloud hosting
We built the CSSC website to suit a self healing, autoscaling environment on AWS. This means for all the years we’ve looked after the site, they have not had any issues with downtime. Server checks and updates are carried out weekly.
We’ve also added reporting so they can see at a glance when other 3rd party integrations are offline, along with tools that can then help manage the user experience when that occurs.
Membership app
We built a Membership App which meant people could access their current membership status from their phone, but crucially, it would still work if they were in a remote area with no phone coverage. Sophisticated techniques meant people couldn’t share access or screenshots. We built a hybrid app, meaning it was cost effective to build but was still accessed via app stores – saving the organisation hundreds of thousands of pounds in distributing physical cards.
Active Wellbeing Week
Before work began on the main Laravel site, CSSC asked us to – very quickly – build them a site for their Active Wellbeing Week campaign. That quick WordPress project has lasted for years, and has evolved to include many more features:
Gamification
For one campaign, the AWW site asked people to set themselves a target. They could then earn badges as they worked towards their goals. We devised how the game could work, and then designed and built the game Dashboard.
Gated content
Designed to work as smoothly as possible with Civil Service and Public Sector IT solutions, the gated content solution we built allows people to quickly and easily access AWW content whilst allowing the AWW team access to important data.
Rebrands
Each year the AWW takes on a slightly different look and feel, and we can quickly and easily update the messaging on the website to reflect the current messaging.
When I check, on average 33% of CSSC’s support queries receive a (human) reply within 10 minutes. The remaining 66% receive a reply within an hour!