Background

The Toy Factory is a small toy store located in New Glasgow, PEI. The store has been in operation for 45 years and is owned by Dan Viau and Kathy Viau. The physical store location is open during the summer months, as well as in the lead-up to Christmas. The focus of the store is on high quality toys that spark a child’s imagination.

Approach

The Toy Factory had a small website created in-house, but wanted to improve the site as well as provide e-commerce. Dan is very excited about his toys, and quickly becomes enthused and animated when talking about the store. The grounds of the store are a playground in themselves, while the inside of the store is a child’s paradise, jammed with high quality toys that you won’t easily find at the large retailers.
The objective in building the site was to convey a different feel to the site. As Dan is a former journalist, he is also a storyteller. So the home page was created with a horizontal scrolling feature, laying out the options in a flowing, storied manner. All items were indexed in two ways – by category of toy, and again by manufacturer. This provides landing pages for search engines to use for multiple queries. A custom description was created for every item online to distinguish the store from others that may carry the product.
Continuing on from the creation of the website, a supporting Google AdWords campaign was set up, and further outreach through newsletters and social media support were provided.

Results

The Toy Factory website has been operating for a number of years, with slight periodic updates. The e-commerce is generating another revenue stream for the business, while the AdWords and outreach remain important drivers of traffic.