(616) 356-2545 15 Ionia Ave. SW, Suite 220 - Grand Rapids, MI 49503

Ecommerce

Online Sales Tax

June 25th, 2018 by Ima Admin

On June 21st, 2018, the Supreme Court of the US (SCOTUS) overruled 1992’s Quill Corp v. North Dakota case in South Dakota v. Wayfair in a 5 to 4 vote.

Back in 1992, Quill stated that US states could only change sales taxes on companies with a physical presence in the state. Effectively, Quill determined how state taxes worked with e-commerce from the web’s first days. Started in 1956, Quill, a direct and mail order office supply retailer, has grown to be one of the largest business-to-business office supply retailers in the U.S. at over $1 billion in annual sales with 70% of that coming from internet sales. Quill was acquired by Staples, Inc. in 1998.

The 1992 Court did not have before it the present realities of the interstate marketplace or how the Internet’s prevalence and power would change the dynamics of the national economy. Here’s some of the 2018 reasoning…
Read the rest of this entry »


Site Launch: Groom Team USA

September 1st, 2016 by Ima Admin

GroomTeam USA, Inc. is a non-profit organization which encourages professional pet stylists in the United States to maximize their grooming education and skills, and offers them the opportunity to represent the U.S. at World Team Competitions.

Many of the stylists in GroomTeam are members of the award-winning, Learn to Groom Dogs site, which IFI launched a little over a year ago. The team knew that we could make a site that would tell their story and inform their followers about the team, their events and ways the public could help.


Site Launch: Cutting Horse Training Online

August 9th, 2016 by Ima Admin

IFI_Blog_CHTO2_552x587Similar to a previous client, Simone & Duncan, owners of Cutting Horse Training Online (CHTO) out of Texas had built a successful online video education program that was functional but had outstripped the underlying design and technology of their current partners.

Having seen the transformation the Imagination Factory for the other client, they asked what was possible. CHTO had a few more things happening in their site, so once again we spent a lot of time investigating their specific needs, researching current technology they were using, and especially discussing the shortfalls of the current site – for both the owners and the users.

The result is a subscription-based, members-only, ecommerce, mobile-responsive site with hundreds of streaming videos & podcasts from multiple sources and by numerous training partners and grooming experts from around the world. Additionally, this site also needed to tie into third-parties InfusionSoft & Click Funnel for extensive email marketing campaigns, Dartfish for private video critiques, and SoundCloud for Podcast streaming. The site allows members to search and view streaming categorized videos on their desktop, tablet or even smartphone. In addition to basic ecommerce for books, DVDs and apparel, the site also needed to support an event calendar/ticketing system for clinics and workshops. Members may subscribe monthly, quarterly or annually to one of three different membership levels via several payment gateways to gain access to videos that are searchable by category, by training partner, by title.

This one raised the bar, yet again, on the built-in functions and capabilities that we’ve been asked to design into a site!

Mosey on over to the NEW CHTO site.


Site ReDesign: Kentwood Office Furniture

July 14th, 2016 by Ima Admin

IFIblog_KWOF_552x587Although many of our website solutions are built to serve our clients well for many years, technology continues to march forward providing new options and marketing channels of which to take advantage. At a minimum, we suggest revisiting the site design every five years or less.

Kentwood Office Furniture is the Midwest’s specialist in high quality remanufactured, used, and new office furniture and is well aware of rapidly changing environments. As a result, Kentwood Office and the Imagination Factory takes a look every 2-3 years at the site and how best to leverage the new technology and aesthetics in their site.

For your own closer inspection, visit the NEW KENTWOOD OFFICE site.


Ecommerce: Minor League, Major Food

March 20th, 2016 by Ima Admin

baseball_suite-300x224Yessir, it’s baseball season once again and time to update over a dozen client’s “SOCS” (suite online catering system) websites.

Team IFI’s SOCS sites are customized for each participating club and allow baseball fans who have rented a game day suite to order online from their club’s catering menu.

Each year we added a few more clubs to the IFI SOCS roster. If your favourite ball club doesn’t offer it yet, have them contact us at the Imagination Factory.


Site Launch: Green Wellness

February 27th, 2016 by Ima Admin

IFIblog_GWL_smWelcome to Green Wellness, Grand Rapids’ home to holistic oils, tinctures, salves, lotions and supplements containing the highest grade of Cannabidiol (CBD), which comes from the NON-psychotropic cannabis plant known as Hemp.

Owners, Jim & Brandy, wanted to put a website to put their holistic products based within reach of people seeking healthier lifestyles and relief from symptoms of disease. They found many of the sites out there selling similar products were garish and appeared to cater to an entirely different audience than they intended.

For this startup business, the team at the Imagination Factory designed their logo, their business cards and their mobile-responsive ecommerce site.

Take a health look at GREEN WELLNESS


Site Launch: Horny’s Big Buck Blend

February 5th, 2016 by Ima Admin

IFIblog_HBBB_smHorny’s Big Buck Blend is a specially formulated blend of all-natural, agricultural grade products and ingredients that is easy for hunters or sports persons to use. It is designed to provide outstanding supplemental nutrition to deer and elk, helping them grow healthier, bigger and heavier antlers.

The business had outgrown its previous site, so they had us develop a full ecommerce, mobile-responsive, content managed structure (CMS) where the public and potential resellers could buy his unique product.

Grow more bone with HORNY’S


Site Launch: One Breath For All

November 20th, 2015 by Ima Admin

IFIblog_1B4A_smThe owners of the private practice, One Breath For All, since 2009 were now ready to expand their marketing efforts and wanted an online method to promote their energy work as well as allow people to register for their spiritual workshops, classes and retreats.

Because they also work with businesses to organize company events and retreats, they began asking their clients about their websites. More than several referred them to the team at Imagination Factory.

We were able to put them into a mobile-responsive, content managed structure (CMS) with an ecommerce component allowing them to ‘sell’ reservations from the site to their events, workshops and retreats. Their events not only are found in their site, but are also automagically published to a third-party event system giving their events even more exposure.

Visit them at ONE BREATH FOR ALL


Site Launch: Wheeler Business Machines

October 30th, 2015 by Ima Admin

IFIblog_WBM_smFollowing Google’s ‘mobilegeddon’ updates, Wheeler Business Machines, began noticing a fall-off of site traffic and phone calls, despite their continuous SEO efforts.

The site was large, with a lot of good product content, but it was also quite old – predating tablets and smartphones, so it was still an HTML-based site, not mobile responsive with no real ecommerce function.

The Imagination factory re-designed the site into a CMS-based structure and gave them a much easier e-commerce setup which was not only mobile responsive, but easier to search optimize AND manage the site content. Client is much more productive at managing the site, the site is regaining its search ‘juice’, calls AND orders are flowing at a higher rate.

Visit WHEELER BUSINESS MACHINES


Site Launch: Kentwood Office Chicago

September 18th, 2015 by Ted Bailey

IFIblog_KOFC_smLooking to further distinguish themselves in Chicago’s very competitive market, existing client Kentwood Office Furniture, asked the Imagination Factory to spawn a similar, but different, site for the Chicago market.

It needed to continue the main Kentwood branding, but needed to establish its own unique presence in both that geographic market but in search as well.

And because it was splintering off the main site, it needed to do as little as possible to mess with the existing search positioning garnered over the years. With new great design and judcious use of 301 redirects, we were able to do just that.

Learn more at Kentwood Office Chicago


Sounds neat! We should talk.

Talk to Us
  • GR office link to google maps
  • PageRank