SportPAD

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Added on 11 November 2017 Category Technology Website www.sportpad.net Developer Rocca

Tell us a bit about the history of the agency and how you've reached where you are today.

Rocca is a full service creative consultancy based in the north of England. We have an international spread of customers, ranging in size from Blue Chip to SMEs. We began life offering brand creation and management services and have become progressively more involved in digital work as part of our brand solutions. Today we service organisations such as Unilever, Lloyds Banking Group and Philips UK.

Why have you chosen to work with Orchard on this project?

We have previously used commercial CMS products and found these to be far too limited with lack of extensibility and more importantly lack of community. Primarily developing with Microsoft technologies and utilising MVC, Orchard seemed like the perfect fit with a reduced learning curve, while still offering a great user interface.

Tell us about the site (new, redesign, Orchard integration?) What were the client’s needs?

The SportPAD brand reflects the sporting nature of its customer base. It was important to differentiate it from its competitors while engaging its audience. The site is intended to inform and encourage enquiries, without the need for extensive reading.

Which modules did you use and why?

Orchard comes integrated with some great modules for both site and development usage, including Shape Tracing, Url Alternative, Projections and Blog. Orchard’s vast community of developers allows you to experiment with new Modules without apprehension. OForms by ExtendOrchard has to be the most useful, offering the ability to create forms with ease while combining database storage and email functionality.

In your opinion, what's the best thing about working with Orchard?

Finally getting a CMS that gives you back complete control, where necessary, with theme and module creation being seamless. With the ability to use MVC Razor syntax and Orchards effective alternative views feature, creating themes is once again enjoyable, rather than having to edit templates within the browser or using some random custom syntax.

What's the most bizarre request you've had from a client?

Bizarre requests come almost daily, but we were once asked to produce a load of branded balloons. The client (a recruitment organisation) then released the helium filled balloons into the air with the intention of reaching jobseekers. Needless to say the campaign was not a success, and to this day we have no idea how many balloons remained on land as the organisation was based in a coastal town.