The Pleasure Chest
is pioneering a sex positive culture
Rescuing The Pleasure Chest from a Crisis to Record Conversions
The Challenge
When The Pleasure Chest reached out to Command C, they were in a critical situation. Their newly launched site had caused a drastic drop in conversions, leaving them struggling to pinpoint the issues and recover lost revenue. They needed immediate help to stabilize their online store and a long-term technical partner to optimize and maintain their site.
Command C stepped in and, within months, turned the situation around. Comparing the six months before our engagement with the six months after, The Pleasure Chest experienced:
This initial success laid the groundwork for a more comprehensive project: migrating from Magento 1, which was reaching its end-of-life, to BigCommerce, while preserving their brand identity, SEO strength, and complex product data.
Project Goals
- Identify and Fix Immediate Issues: Address the conversion drop and stabilize the site to restore sales.
- Future-Proof the Platform: Migrate from Magento 1 to a more scalable and maintainable solution in BigCommerce.
- Preserve Brand Identity and SEO: Replicate the look and feel of the existing site while maintaining strong SEO rankings and minimizing disruptions to customer experience.
- Seamlessly Migrate Complex Data: Transfer all product data, including custom fields, to BigCommerce without losing any critical information.
The Plan
After stabilizing the existing site, we began planning the migration to BigCommerce, focusing on platform evaluation, seamless data migration, and preservation of SEO integrity.
Selecting BigCommerce as the Optimal Platform
We evaluated various ecommerce platforms and determined that BigCommerce was the best fit for The Pleasure Chest’s needs. Its native support for custom fields allowed us to implement detailed product filtering, enabling customers to search for items based on specific features like size, material, and more. This robust functionality aligned perfectly with The Pleasure Chest’s diverse product catalog and commitment to customer satisfaction.
Maintaining Brand Identity and Enhancing User Experience
The Pleasure Chest wanted to keep the familiar look and feel of their Magento 1 site while improving functionality. We recreated the existing design on BigCommerce, incorporating subtle enhancements and new features. This included an improved navigation system with a “Popular Products” section and a revamped “Shop by Department” feature on the homepage, supporting both user experience and SEO goals.
Preserving SEO and Expanding Content Capabilities
To protect their strong SEO standing, we collaborated with an SEO agency to ensure a smooth transition. Initially, we planned to migrate the integrated WordPress blog to a standalone education site. However, this posed a risk to their SEO rankings. Instead, we integrated the blog directly into BigCommerce, allowing The Pleasure Chest to maintain their SEO credibility while providing a cohesive experience for customers.
Additionally, we created a new blog for their events and video content at sexisback.com, which integrates seamlessly with the BigCommerce store. This strategy helped preserve their valuable SEO history and enabled them to continue building their brand through engaging content.
Migrating Complex Product Data
The Pleasure Chest’s products are as unique as their customers, with many custom attributes defining each item. Migrating this intricate data from Magento to BigCommerce required a tailored solution. We wrote custom scripts to extract data directly from the Magento database and map it to BigCommerce’s data structure, ensuring every detail was accurately transferred.
We also collaborated with Modern Retail to integrate their ERP, Epicor/Eagle, with BigCommerce. This integration ensured real-time communication between product data, inventory, and orders, maintaining operational efficiency.
Enhancing Customer Experience with Custom Features
To make it easier for customers to explore products, we added a “Popular Products” section to the navigation, guiding users to the best-selling items. The redesigned “Shop by Department” on the homepage now includes both subcategories and top product recommendations, offering a more intuitive shopping experience.
We also enabled gift certificates to be used both online and in physical stores, integrating this functionality with their ERP. This enhancement extended the usability of gift certificates beyond in-store purchases, providing greater flexibility for customers.
“Our site lost significant revenue and traffic following the launch. Command C came in with a strong plan to address the issues. They helped us recover sales and turned conversion around within a few months. ”
– Sarah Tomchessen, The Pleasure Chest
The Results
- Restored and Improved Conversions: Within months of our initial engagement, The Pleasure Chest saw a dramatic increase in conversions and revenue, highlighting the effectiveness of our immediate interventions.
- Seamless Migration to BigCommerce: The site transition was executed flawlessly, with all complex product data and SEO history preserved. Customers enjoyed a familiar but enhanced shopping experience.
- Optimized Customer Experience: Improved navigation, product filtering, and content integration made the site more user-friendly, increasing customer satisfaction and engagement.
- Streamlined Operations: The integration with Epicor/Eagle ensures smooth data flow between the ecommerce platform and backend systems, reducing manual work and potential errors.
Looking Ahead
With a modern, scalable platform in place, The Pleasure Chest is well-positioned for continued growth and innovation. The successful migration has not only preserved their SEO strength and brand identity but also opened new opportunities for improving customer experience and operational efficiency.
“I'm loving how the site feels. The speed is incredible! I can't tell you how many times I went on the old site and it would take eons to load page after page. Every time my heart would sink knowing that we were losing customers since people don't wait and losing value since we would get knocked for our site speeds. And we made it through a pandemic.”
– Brian Robinson, The Pleasure Chest
