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~ Intershop ~

based. For example, if you buy pens, we might offer you it is the heart of our website. Intershop is our e-commerce
note blocks using a pop-up when you place the pens in the platform, but it also is our CMS, so, in a sense. This was an
shopping cart, for example. This is all fully automated and older version of Intershop, so what we did was add all the
integrated into our smart funnel,” says Michael. applications and functionalities we needed and build our own
custom Intershop e-commerce solution. For example, for
“The other significant advantage is that we work together as search and merchandising, and filtering, we use Tweakwise;
a team: we don’t work isolated in silos. Our SEO talks to the for the payment solution, we use Ayden; for the feeds that
SEA department, and they talk to the sales department, and we generate from the website, we use Adchieve to send the
the sales team talks to the Conversion Rate Optimization feeds to our advertising programs or to our display programs,
team, and all of them talk with the marketing teams, and back so with Intershop at its core, we have been able to build a
and forth. Everything is blended and built together. Also, we lot of applications around it. And this is what is great about
manage a lot of things in-house. We have our own product Intershop; it is super-fast, is good to go from the start, and is
information management system—PIM—so we can really stable. This makes it a powerful tool for B2B commerce, and I
control and manage our products in a highly customised and think that for B2B professionals, Intershop is one of the best
efficient way. This allows, for example, a relatively small team systems any player can buy.”
of 3 Category Managers to be able to handle over 340,000
products and variations across Europe, and that is a lot. In a sense, what you are saying is that using an old
core version of Intershop, you were able to develop a
Finally, I think this is the most socially committed company sort of composable commerce solution?
that I know of. “Yes. By developing
I mean, IGO is “BECAUSE WE OPERATE AS A B2C COMPANY inside Intershop,
committed to we were more than
reducing the use IN THE B2B BUSINESS, WE HAVE A LOT OF B2C able to add all the
of plastic, and we TACTICS FOR MARKETING THAT WE IMPLEMENT AT microservices and
know that people functionality needed
are also bending A COMPETITIVE LEVEL IN OUR WEBSITE” to make it more
towards that. composable while
Because who wants retaining the solid
to leave a damaged world for their children? Who wants core solution that Intershop gives us.”
their grandsons and granddaughters suffering up to 50º in
summer in the Netherlands? Nobody. Add to that the fact Was it a complex thing to do?
that IGO, part of Plato Group, is the only company in its “It is always difficult to make custom solutions inside a CMS,
sector that has donated up to 18 million euros to charity, and and you need to have support for this. In our case, we had
you can easily notice that IGO, part of Plato Group, is fully developers in-house, thanks to Fenego. So, what we did was,
committed to being a force of good: good for society, good for via Fenego, we hired in-house developers with over 15 years
the environment and good for our clients.” It’s called the 3P of experience that knew their way around Intershop perfectly
model; People, Planet & Profit. well. Thanks to that, we were able to deal with our legacy
software that was not API-able and built everything in a
Intershop: A solid base for a powerful B2B evolution more headless solution format, with all parts talking to each
IGO e-commerce is tailormade. The level of customisation other via APIs. I think that this is the future; in fact, the new
they have achieved is one of the main reasons behind their Intershop version does the same exact thing: it offers a more
success. This has only been made possible by combining composable approach while also keeping the solid core that
in-house development, outsourced expertise, and above all, a gives you speed and reliability. I think Intershop noticed this
solid base upon which to build this complex customised setup. trend and evolved in that way.
A base that is none other than Intershop.
But the funny thing is that we did that even before Intershop
Alongside Fenego, IGO was able to develop in-house did it, and we did it because we couldn’t upgrade to the new
solutions that created their own brand of Intershop with all Intershop version at that time due to all our legacy software
the apps and functionalities required by their trade. This is a not being capable of functioning. So, if we tried to upgrade,
testament to both IGO and Fenego ingenuity and Intershop’s everything would have fallen apart. In the end, thanks
amazing Packaged Business Capabilities that allow any user to Fenego, our developers, and Intershop’s solid core and
to modify the solid e-commerce core to fit any need. evolving capabilities, we were able to build a future-proof
Intershop version of our own.”
Why have you selected Intershop to be your
e-commerce solution? IGO’s Future: Trends and goals
“We have been working with Intershop for a long time. And IGO’s evolution is not a matter of chance but a work of

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