How we’re backing SNS with a sound e-commerce platform and technology.
SNS E-commerce, Platform EDGE
SNS is the first e-commerce store ever created by Panagora. This is how we helped them become one of the world’s leading sneaker stores.
Insight
Insight
SNS was founded in 1999 out of the love and curiosity for the culture and life around sneakers, music, fashion, art, and basketball. Energizing culture through creativity and serving their community with integrity.
SNS commissioned Panagora for a complete overhaul of their e-commerce platform way back in 2001. The current site was suffering from several challenges including lack of stock integration and a poor product management system. This project was the beginning of a long and fruitful collaboration, and also laid the foundation for our e-commerce Platform EDGE.
Idea
The initial idea was to develop a solution to improve stock keeping between online and in-store to avoid overselling. The second was to reduce time to market by implementing a smarter product and content management system. We created a platform that allowed real time integration to manage the dynamic inventory, which led to a better overall user experience and higher customer satisfaction.
The next challenge was to optimise for international shoppers. This gave birth to the idea of EDGE Markets; a way to customize and schedule communication to the different customer segments. This allowed SNS to localise the site to support multiple currencies and languages and curate products and campaigns for each segment.
As SNS grew on, so did the problem with abuse, bad bots and automated, fraudulent behaviour. In 2014, even though it was possible to sell out all products, SNS demanded a fairer solution. This became one of the biggest challenges yet. After lots of research, trial and error, traffic analysis we succeeded in implementing a new bot management service in collaboration with Cloudflare. It enabled SNS to do flash-drops; sell high demand products with minimal site downtime - and increase the chances for real people to get hold of those limited releases.
Still, as demand continued to outgrow supply due to the secondary market offering multiple times the money back, the problem with fair online releases was still not entirely solved. SNS formed a new mission, and by noticing a shift in consumer behaviour they decided to move from “first come first served” and on-demand purchases to pre-sale and signups. Panagora was commissioned to build the first version of a dedicated “raffle” web application and a mobile app with native iOS and Android support. The app would allow SNS to reach a huge number of consumers without risking site downtime and lost sales opportunities.
Later, the app spurred SNS to roll out the groundforce of their own in-house tech team, collaborating closely with the Panagora team to build technical sound solutions upon a shared subset of data and functionality.
“Panagora’s ability to quickly respond to our technical challenges and work together with us to find solutions has proven unprecedented for our growth and success.”
Impact
SNS is now a reputable company and global brand growing from strength to strength. With a strong brand recognition and customer base in over 90 different countries it still seems the journey has just begun.
In our collaboration over the years, our efforts have helped SNS to:
- Increase customer experience and happiness through a faster and more stable site
- Collaborated and advised on multiple integrations with the ERP-backend
- Increase revenue and reach of target groups by localising the site, as SNS expanded from one retail destination in Stockholm, to retail destinations in New York City, Los Angeles, London, Paris, and Japan.
- Launch the first version of the “raffle” web app with native iOS and Android support focused on sneaker releases. The app reached over 1 million verified users within the first year from launching
Getting inspired by our work and curious how we can help elevate your business? Reach out to us, and let’s arrange a meet and greet to discuss your goals and how we can drive your success.