Bringing 70 brands under one umbrella platform for the world's largest FMCG company

The challenge

The client's old platform was the Shell CMS legacy system (SharePoint 2010) which was difficult and expensive to maintain and update. There were multiple websites for a single region making it tough for customers to find the information they needed.

The CMS lacked a centralized system for job applications and did not have the scalability to support the client's growing business. We addressed these pain points by migrating the websites to Drupal CMS which follows the latest trends and has long-term support.

The approach

The client was looking for a cost-effective and scalable solution to host all their websites, and we decided that Drupal 8 was an ideal choice due to its multilingual and multisite capabilities.

Drupal also provides the ability to host multiple sites using the same brand identity, which was a major requirement for the client. We migrated content from multiple SharePoint sites to the new Drupal 8 site including all product details, product categories, and imagery.

The solution

Drupal migration

We migrated 70+ websites (approximately 24,700+ pages) from SharePoint to Drupal 8. The migration was meticulously planned to ensure minimum disruption for the markets. We worked closely with the client to address any potential issues, and we successfully migrated all websites on time and within budget.

Component-based approach

We adopted a component-based development approach, which allows content managers to create flexible pages while maintaining the same design standards across all market websites.

This approach breaks down a website into reusable components, such as headers, footers, and content blocks, that can be easily assembled and customized to create different pages.

Centralized job portal

We integrated multiple third-party services to create a centralized job portal that provides consistent data on job openings across all 70+ country sites. This eliminates content duplication and other recruitment-related issues.

Geolocation

The career portal's centralized repository contains jobs from different geographies. We implemented a geolocation feature to ensure that users see the most relevant jobs first. This feature uses the website language and user location to determine the user's location, so they can view jobs in their area.

Multilingual website

We merged the client's different multilingual websites into a single website with multilingual capabilities. It means that users can view the website in their preferred language, regardless of where they are located.

We also designed all components and layouts to accommodate both right-to-left (RTL) and left-to-right (LTR) content. This is important because one of the client's markets is in the Middle East, where Arabic is the regional language that follows the RTL format.

Form builder

We configured and customized web forms and their related modules to allow content managers to create and manage forms that meet the specific needs of each market and geolocation. This gives the marketing teams the flexibility to generate forms that are tailored to their audience and requirements.

Stock API

We integrated a stock API to allow content managers to display the current stock update on the portal. This stock information block can be configured to be displayed on any page or section, and the stock details are updated dynamically.

SEO optimization

We enabled data-layer on the Contact Us forms and hero banners to track user behavior on the content. We also integrated Google Tag Manager (GTM) to consolidate all analytics integrations under a single platform.

Feed parser

To allow each marketing team to integrate feeds from different sources onto the website, we developed a flexible component with multiple configuration options. The component could be configured to specify the feed URL, cache time, feed fields to display, section color, and so on.

Platform development

We used Acquia Cloud Site Factory to implement platform-level development and feature rollouts. This allowed us to deploy new features and updates quickly and easily to the website, without disrupting the user experience.

The outcome

The client was able to build and manage all of their websites under one platform. The scalable platform made it easy to launch new websites for different regions without additional costs and adapt to the organization's global growth.

The centralized job portal improved the recruitment process by providing consistent data across all country sites. The Drupal 8 platform also enhanced the overall customer experience by providing a consistent and high-quality experience across all websites.