Brand Image and Messaging / Website Redesign / Search Engine Optimisation / Website Content / WordPress Development / Landing Page Development / Digitalisation of services and procedures / Marketing Brochure
PFI Group is the world-leading expert in auditing, training, quality inspection, and certification in the footwear and textile industry. Their mission is to certify the quality and sustainability of products and of their supply chain.Originally based in Germany, in 2005 they opened a branch in Hong Kong.
PFI Fareast needed a new B2B website, together with new printed marketing materials – brochures and flyers – for conferences and fairs.
“Our main aim was to revamp the website and make our company image look more modern to match with the current times.”
Through the new website and marketing material, they wished to convey a more modern image of the newly opened branch in Hong Kong.
When they contacted Mowgli, the team at PFI Fareast already had a structure for the new website, and they needed us to work on the content. However, when our digital copywriter went through the existing website structure, she noticed problems with UX. The website that they were building was based on a template and not on the user journey.
Mowgli communicated the UX findings to the PFI team, and they decided to start by working on the overall brand message, identity and UX, to then move on to a full re-design and development of the website.
The PFI Group was founded in 1956. With over 60 years of experience is a worldwide recognised expert in footwear.
“Through our new website and brochures, we aimed to update our image, making it fresh, young and intuitive. We also wanted to emphasise our technical expertise and knowledge to maintain a trustworthy relationship with our clients, and create new ones.”
They mainly have B2B clients, who know the brand very well and are used to a technical communication and a knowledgeable service.
For this reason, one of the main challenges of creating a new website for PFI Fareast was to refresh the brand image and giving it its own identity.
One equally important challenge was to adapt the content to the new design. Initially, they provided us with a large quantity of long-form copy, very technical and complex because mainly translated from English to German. Also, their original website’s service pages were more than 15, a number that would have not fitted with the goal of making the website look more modern and lighter.
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To address the first challenge, how to convey a fresher and younger brand image, while maintaining the voice of the group and talking to a technical B2B audience, we propose to create new design guidelines (logo, colour palette and fonts) based on the ones of the PFI group. Once approved, the design guidelines were used across all channels and platforms, online and offline.
For the second challenge, how to reduce the overall content while comprehensively showing services and conveying an expert tone, our content team conducted an interview with the internal marketing team of PFI Fareast, who provided documents with long-form copy. The aim of the interview was to understand what really mattered for both the company and clients in terms of content and which tone to employ across all channels.
Our UX and web designer worked closely – yet remotely – with the PFI team to create a fresher image of the PFI Fareast brand, without moving too much apart from the one of the group.
We opted for a simple, yet fresh, blue-and-white colour palette, and we played with modern icons and imagery.
“The Mowgli Team gave us several options to choose from, to really find the design we want.”
After that, we moved on to reduce and refine the copy, to then work on the final design of both brochures and flyers, and website.
We had a strict deadline due to an upcoming conference, where the PFI Fareast team needed to present and hand-out marketing materials.
Our web designer and our digital copywriter work together to agree on the structure of the brochure and flyers and how much content should fit in it. The content was drastically reduced and the tone slightly modified, to sound fresh while professional.
Once the brochure and flyers were approved, we started to plan the website.
First, we created a preliminary website map, to understand what PFI Fareast and their B2B clients needed from the website, then we proceeded with the wireframes.
“Mowgli had a strategic approach to developing these services for us and understood our requirements very well.”
We understood that their service pages and description were too many and too long. Together with our SEO strategist, we proposed a revision of their services, based on keywords and users queries. We suggested reducing the number of service pages from 15 to 11. This made their offer clearer, with a more concise website structure, easier to navigate by the users.
One of the main aims of PFI Fareast is to assess and certify environmental and social aspects of the textile and footwear supply chains. Their website, and related marketing material, needed to convey the message of a company that cares about current matters, and about the future of the industry. A company with more than 60 years of experience, but with young minds willing to work on present challenges, to create a better future for their clients, and, in general, for the planet.
With a full team effort, design, content, SEO and development, we created a website that responds to both the challenges and wishes of PFI Fareast. The result is a fresh-looking website, easy to navigate, with modern icons and imagery.
Also, it’s a website easy to be managed by the PFI Fareast team, a crucial point for our aim of providing our clients with websites that are long-term sustainable.
“Mowgli has provided us with training and recorded instructions so that we can take over the website and edit content ourselves.”
To easily edit a website is key in nowadays ever-changing digital marketing scenarios, allowing companies and businesses to quickly update campaigns, launch new products and services and modify outdated content.
Almost a year had passed since the launch of their new website, and PFI Fareast came back to us to work on the creation of a landing page for a new type of certification and service they are offering, “Recycled Material Certification.”
We completely redesign the certificate, including a new logo, brand guidelines and e-book for client use. We structured and created content for the landing page, including a B2B form for manufacturers to apply, and a search engine for the customers to check if the product they bought is made from recycled material.
Our key contribution here, from both a strategy and execution perspective, was the digitalisation of the service. Before, guidelines and application forms were in paper-form. This was slowing down the process, requiring more energy and time from the team. Now, the whole procedure is digitalised, easier to access and to go through.
To conclude, one key detail (we kept it until the end on purpose….!)
The Mowgli team and the PFI Fareast team never met, neither before or during our collaboration. We connected thanks to a common client met through the coworking space we work from in Bali.
“Even though PFI is based in Hong Kong and Mowgli across Indonesia, Australia and Europe the Mowgli team was always available to support us.”
But there’s more. Mowgli is a fully distributed team, across three continents. When working on the PFI project, our team was spread across Indonesia, Italy and Australia.
How do we do this? It’s all about trust, effective communication, and the right tools.
