Oftentimes, an expensive pricing tag and status act as a kind of success guarantee.
Indeed, professionals value their work well and are unlikely to provide their expertise for mere pennies. They have enough money orders. At the same time, the sky-high cost cannot ensure an excellent result.
And this is exactly the kind of story we’d like to share from the individual SOFTLOFT practice.
Prologue
Not so long ago, a Scandinavian company contacted us with a rather problematic project to work on. The product was a Magento-based marketplace for the sale of consumer products of trusted brands in the Nordic countries and Germany. This project was developed and implemented by a very famous, large-scale developer.
For fairness’ sake, it should be noted that the marketing and product presentation part of the deal was performed in an exemplary manner:
- there was a step-by-step thought out subsequent growth strategy;
- more than one case study had been researched;
- a team of professional was involved in the project;
- beneficial partnership deals with some of the largest European production companies were made (e.g., Unilever and others).
At the same time, however, the technical aspect of the project was rather raw and required significant improvements. Let's dwell on the main issues SOFTLOFT specialists eventually faced.
Workflow Organization
The common understanding of the project was virtually non-existent, which led to constant delays in the launch dates for the multi-vendor marketplace beta. Google Documents and Gmail were clearly not enough for full-fledged work, not to mention the issues of distribution between performers and the priority of tasks.
Solving multi vendor marketplace approach issues
Coping with these initial challenges didn’t take much time. We used quite trivial tools and approaches. In particular, we:
- assigned a Product Owner to prioritize tasks and optimize in-team communication;
- implemented a management and control system via Jira;
- developed and implemented an Agile-based tool for clear, transparent team workflow management in two-week sprints;
- introduced daily scrum call-ups;
- settled with an efficient workflow algorithm for setting, describing, completing, and closing tasks.
The results
Due to all the above-described efforts, soon, we’d witnessed:
- the growing speed of task completion;
- a higher percentage of tasks done on the deadline.
All in all, our workflow optimization input allowed the whole dedicated team to better understand current and future strategic goals, which ultimately boosted the efficiency and quality of operations.
Multi-Vendor Marketplace Platform Bug Fixing
The administrative issues described above were just the tip of the iceberg. It took much longer to fix technical problems. The main problems faced by the SOFTLOFT specialists were.
- Poor use of the available resources. A Magento multi-vendor marketplace in work used to freeze when importing a thousand products at the same time, with a hundred times higher calculated capacity.
- Data leakage threats. There was an unprotected protocol of communication between the multi-vendor eCommerce platform and the Symfony-based portal.
- Weak synchronization. The system was very far behind in terms of data update time (warehouse, prices, balances, etc.) from the declared requirements. Again, freezes were commonplace. And reliable, up-to-date information is one of the foundations of the best multi-vendor eCommerce platforms on the market.
Read also: How to choose a Magento Agency
Coping with issues
To handle all the underlying tasks, we decided to divide developers into 3 sub-teams with outlined functions. At the same time, the coordination of workflow was centralized.
Team A
This one was engaged in solving key support problems and fixing bugs of the finished MVP. The work was carried out both for Magento and Symfony. The situation was aggravated by a tough monthly deadline - partners pressured the client to launch a beta version of the multi-vendor marketplace software as fast as possible.
The developers worked seven days a week, but having postponed the execution by only a week (considering the amount of time wasted by the previous company - and insignificant delay), they achieved the correct operation of the key functions of the system.
Team B
This team was responsible for solving design problems and completing system refactoring. Eliminating all issues provided a Magento marketplace in hand with reliable protection, granting much smoother performance. A more flexible structure paved lots of space for extensions. We were working in parallel with Magento, API, and Symfony.
An almost complete overhaul of all components took about 6 months, but as a result, the client received a correctly, efficiently working, protected MVP.
Team C
Along with two other teams, these guys supported the current version of the product. After the completion of work by teams A and B, they ensured a proper transfer of data to the new site.
Work Done
The increased efficiency of workflows, up-to-date business leading data (balances, payments, prices, etc.), and the reinforced security of customer data have helped boost the client’s reputation in the eyes of buyers and suppliers. This allows our client not only to stay afloat in difficult times of the pandemic or crisis but also to build up momentum.
If you saw familiar problems that you may have in your projects in this article - contact SOFTLOFT specialists right now to timely eliminate them. Our experience helps us find the best solutions at the lowest costs and in the shortest time frames.
