Veritiv Canada

Veritiv drives client acquisition and online sales with increased targeted traffic, greater visibility and improved accessibility.
COMPANY
Veritiv Canada (formerly Unisource Canada)
 
DESCRIPTION
Veritiv is Canada’s largest single-source distributor of nearly 50,000 printing, graphic arts, packaging, and facility supply products with annual sales exceeding $1 billion.

BRANDING STRATEGY
Veritiv continues to emphasize the convenience and ease of online ordering in an attempt to drive new and existing business through the Veritiv website that is fully-integrated with their enterprise resource planning system. The ecommerce solution significantly improves Veritiv’s operational efficiency, but more importantly, helps the company to better serve its clients by delivering more value.

WEB STRATEGY
Veritiv sought to increase targeted traffic to its website in order to drive client acquisition and online sales. Veritiv carries nearly 50,000 products, many of which are searched-for online using search engines such as Google by businesses across Canada. The strategy behind Search Engine Optimization (SEO) updates was to increase visibility for Veritiv products in search engines primarily by increasing the number of pages being indexed while improving page ranks for existing listings and optimizing the Veritiv website and its pages for search.

The Veritiv URL structure was redesigned to contain keywords rather than numerical database keys such as product numbers; each product within the database was given its own unique URL and dedicated page which allows it to be indexed by search engines—previously impossible using only JavaScript. Product hierarchies became addressable with search engine-friendly URLs; manufacturers, categories and subcategories were included in the new URL structure. Each tool and resource available on the Veritiv site was given its own URL. French pages were also given unique URLs rather than serving a language preference based on a session remembered by the browser.

IGNITIONWEB MODULES
Administrator Manager, Media Centre, EasyText Editor, Membership Manager, Mailing List Manager, News Manager, Poll Manager, Careers Manager, FAQ Manager, Links Manager, Promotions Manager, Site Statistics

IGNITIONWEB BACK-END CUSTOMIZATIONS
The customizations made in this implementation of updates to Veritiv’s IgnitionWeb installation included: a real-time inventory implementation, a proof of delivery system, credit card processing capability and live chat customer support.

CUSTOM MODULES
Veritiv Customer Manager, Tools & Resources Manager, MicroSite Manager, Forms Manager

RESULTS
As a result of the SEO updates made to the Veritiv website, pages indexed by Google increased 69,700% in twelve months from 500 to 349,000. Q1-2010 to Q1-2011 comparisons demonstrate year-over-year increases in unique site visitors (up 44% to over 44,000), number of visits (up 34% to over 108,000), and page views (up 18% to over 3.7 million). Products and brands carried by Veritiv are often found within Google’s first-page, top 10 search results. The increased traffic and high page-ranks represent greater visibility for Veritiv, greater prominence for its products within search engine listings, and a growing proportion of Veritiv clients conducting business through the online system. The benefit to Veritiv clients and the general public is improved access to product information, facilitated ordering and an enhanced user experience. The benefit to Veritiv is increased online sales generated by new targeted traffic and account creations.