Case Studies

PureNet took the time to fully understand the needs of the company and our customers before putting together a proposal that was responsive to our needs, all without baffling us with jargon. I look forward to a long and mutually beneficial relationship. Thank you!

Mike Bacon
Managing Director
Academia

Academia

Multi-site B2C and B2B eCommerce Solution with CRM and eProcurement

www.academia.co.uk

Academia are a leading supplier of software, hardware and training goods and services to the education and non-profit sectors.

Established in 2003, the company sell exclusively online and work with a large number of vendors including Adobe, Apple, Autodesk, Quark, Avid and Microsoft.

The new Academia website has been designed with input from Academia’s customers and it supports the company’s aim of being the IT partner of choice rather than just another supplier.

Challenge

PureNet was given the challenge to design a new B2B eCommerce solution that would be easy for potential and existing education sector customers to navigate and for the Academia to administer their large number of products, categories and promotions.

It also needed to support a quick process for account managers to create sales quotations with personalised pricing and allow customers to create their own quotes for other members of their department to view. It also need to support automatic renewal quotations for software licences for existing clients.

In addition, it needed to provide full customer relationship management functionality to track opportunities and track customer interaction with the account managers. Finally, it needed to support punch-out functionality so that Universities could place Academia orders through their own systems.

The system also had to provide a B2C eCommerce solution to the student community based on the same product range offered to the Universities and colleges.

Additionally, functionality was required to integrate into their existing fulfilment processes and accounts systems.

Solution

The solution is built on PureNet’s proven e-commerce framework and has the ability to manage the look and feel of the product pages and descriptions.

The site features ‘five sites within a site’, which provides the ability to target content and offer customer specific pricing to their diverse portfolio of clients.

Academia’s solution also provides a tailored quote management system which can apply the correct discounts, levels of licensing and account manager to each individual customer.

Benefits

As soon as the site went live in November 2009, Academia’s customers were able to raise quotes, place orders and review their order/quote history.

The ease of use and impressive functionality is contributing to the success of the site which began generating a high volume of quotes and sales in its first months of operation.