A custom Webflow build
I didn’t expect things to go as smooth with a web builder
I have been struggling for a while with my previous platform of choice… Wordpress. It seems to be the CMS of choice for many, and with good reason as it doesn’t require much in the way of custom coding with all of the plug-in options. The thing is, we build all of our websites at Niteowl Creative from scratch for Wordpress.
The problems we are facing are, with hundreds of clients it can be quite difficult to keep up on the maintenance for our clients who have opt’d into our maintenance subscription. Therefore we thought maybe reducing this by using Webflow for the simple projects might be applicable here.
The pilot project
We started a custom Ruby build a year ago.
After working with many developers we decided that it’s likely not going to be easy to maintain custom functionality within this build, and decided to research a better way to implement simple pages while keeping the core system in Ruby.
This particular project was Grayman.co – and the landing page for their new polo shirts. This initially seemed like a simple build with the built in e-commerce option but as we dug deeper and unearthed the needs for customizations we found that it might be easier said than done in this platform.
The wish
To have a custom calculator merged with the e-commerce which uses a query to supply the best possible fit to the customer.
I consulted many people around what might be possible and how we could build a custom easement calculator for the shirts.
Easement calculator is a way of finding the proper fit of your shirt. Being the shirt size in inches minus your chest size in inches. The number will give you the room left, and we associated it with the fit of that shirt (fitted, classic, oversized, etc)
It turned out we needed to revise the plan slightly. Building an easement calculator independent of the cart with an output informing the user of the fit best suited for them.
Having this working was the biggest hurdle for us, but the end result is flawless and works like a dream.
In the end
I had a great experience. The delay in the project due to learning curves and scope creep are a natural occurrence with many projects.
This one was no different.
We have already started another two projects in Webflow with some new clients. Excited to see how these two might work out, I have already started documenting our process and accounting for any possible hurdles.
The way in which I am attempting to mitigate any surprises in these projects is a bit of pre-dev research to ensure that :rd party applications can be used as effectively as possible (such as Calendly in this particular case), and that Foxy.io is going to help us build more comprehensive ecommerce products.
Have you used Webflow? What was your experience, and what did you learn in your first project? I love when people share these sorts of stories with me!
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