Blending Style & Function for 105% Increase in Organic Traffic
Styled Home Studios connects owners and managers of expertly curated spaces with creative professionals looking to book brand shoots and corporate events. As a new business in the tech space, they needed a new website that would enhance their efficiency, boost brand awareness and increase bookings.
The Challenges
The existing Styled Home Studios helped them get up and running quickly, but it lacked key data management functionality and tools to help the team to run the business smoothly. Client and property management was clunky, and accounts automation was non-existent. The entire booking process heavily relied on manual intervention from the team which, for a business hoping to grow and scale, was not manageable.
They needed a new website, built with eCommerce best practice, to encourage bookings between hosts and creators – but their existing property data was messy, due to the lack of a consistency when it came to uploading content. With not all hosts being VAT registered, and different pricing, availability and rules between properties, they needed a highly functional system that would quickly calculate rates and commissions to charge the end customer the right amount, before holding the payment and paying out to hosts after the set period following booking completion.
As a growing business they were mindful of costs and needed a platform that could scale with them as they grow. Styled Home Studios believes in aesthetics over volume, so wanted to drive property registrations from the right type of property owner. Their values of relationships, service and style needed to be maintained, whilst being hosted on a solid technical setup.
Our Solution
After a lengthy requirements gathering phase, we built a new peer-to-peer eCommerce website and admin management system based on WordPress and Laravel.
We worked with Styled Home Studios to restructure their data and develop a new process for registering properties, so that all listings on the website are tagged with pre-set attributes for categories including style, lighting, available spaces, colours & materials, parking, accessibility and amenities, that could be used as filtering options and categorisation. This provides customers with ample opportunities to find a property that suits their exact vision – a key requirement when brands have planned their next campaign and are looking for somewhere to shoot it.
Using Stripe Connect we were able to automate the payout processes so that hosts would receive payment on time, calculating the correct amounts after Styled Home Studios’ fees and commissions. Knowing that brands often book months in advance and requirements can change, we also accounted for adding and removing time from bookings, as well as including a refund process cancellation policy – all of which is handled without the need for manual intervention and means a huge reduction in admin processes for the Styled Home Studios team.
Alongside the build, our team worked closely with Styled Home Studios to set up marketing automations, and design training manuals to assist end users with the transition to the new website.
The Result
The feature-rich website combines sleek, classy design coupled with techniques to increase engagement between hosts and creators, with the ultimate goal of increasing booking requests, while the admin system has saved Styled Home Studios countless hours of admin – allowing them to focus on building relationships, growing their portfolio, and driving business growth
The new website has been greatly received by the Styled Home Studios team as well as their community of hosts and end customers. It’s already generating new business through organic search and engagement has increased by 58% in the first 2 months – a sign of the strengthening brand reputation and user experience enhancements that were part of the initial brief.
- 58% increase in engagements
- 87% increase in users
- 105% increase in organic traffic
