Pandemic teaches analog to go digital

The pandemic and subsequent infection control measures have brought businesses and other socially beneficial actors to their knees. To keep the wheels turning, they've had to scramble and quickly come up with new ways to deliver their services. Creative director at Dekode, Øyvind Ellingsen, explains here how fast web solutions can paradoxically often be the most long-term. 

Photo by Erik Mclean on Unsplash

When the coronavirus shut down Norway and effectively put an end to socialization, it paved the way for major changes in society - and not least in the provision of digital services. It became important for businesses, cultural actors and NGOs to quickly establish platforms to deliver their services and fulfill their mandates. There was simply no time to develop and establish large, comprehensive online solutions to meet the demand. 

The need for elementary, quick and efficient solutions that could be improved along the way became more pressing in order to keep the wheels of the company, the stage and the social mission in motion. 

New business models

This time last year, the Brakkesyke concept was launched. Artists streamed small concerts via Facebook to those of us isolated at home on the sofa. In addition to the video stream itself, it was possible to make a provisional and voluntary donation using Vipps. All in all, it was a fairly simple arrangement, but with a very striking concept that managed to reach many people in a short time - using only existing distribution and payment solutions as a prototype.

Øyvind Ellingsen is the creative director of Dekode.

In the restaurant industry, there are many examples of digital services and innovations. For example, one of my favorite places that would normally serve lunch and take away started accepting orders for home delivery of food that you "assembled" yourself at home. Initially, this was done by placing an order on Facebook and then receiving an invoice by email. Once it was paid, you received the delivery a couple of days later. It may not have been the smoothest user experience, but the food was good and the favorite place could keep going. After a while, this was further developed into a small online store with a payment solution and a significantly better user experience.

The local shops on the corner that didn't have digital platforms had to scramble to set up online shops with home delivery or "click and collect" solutions. A simple order via Facebook and payment with Vipps - and hey presto, the merchant himself came to your home in your private car with the shopping bags in the trunk. 

Quick actions become long-term web solutions

Although we in Dekode maybe not ringing the doorbell and delivering a new website to you at your home office, we work somewhat in the same way. When we design and code online solutions for our clients on the WordPress platform, we use a combination of the Growth-Driven Design working method and our in-house framework Teft. 

Øyvind Ellingsen sitting in front of the computer screen
Øyvind Ellingsen thinks on his feet.

When we design and code web solutions according to the Growth-Driven Design method, you will soon have a well-functioning and scalable solution with a corresponding conversion rate. With this approach, we are able to build and launch faster, and then work continuously to improve and optimize based on data and real user behavior. 

Teft is a design system and framework that covers most recurring needs from project to project. It gives our customers enormous leeway - you have a functioning website in a very short time, and you can spend your time on ideas and content, rather than on practicalities. 

In other words, we want to focus both our own and our customers' efforts on what matters most. Together, we find out what's most important and what can wait until later. We also find out what we have to build from scratch and what we can use ready-made components for.

Solve problems along the way

Launching faster and then continuously optimizing will yield better results than solving all possible current and future needs before hitting the launch button. If you wait too long to publish the perfect click-and-collect solution, it won't be there until your customers have adopted your competitors' solutions, or when the pandemic is over and demand has long since returned to normal. 

In other words, spending a lot of time, effort and resources on publishing a static and not very scalable website with very few customization options that will probably have to be scrapped after a couple of years (or after a pandemic) may prove to be inappropriate and rather old-fashioned. 

Are you or your company in need of a new website, online store or perhaps an intranet? Get in touch with us at [email protected]

PS. For a long time, I and many others hoped that there would be festivals this summer, but that doesn't seem to be the case. So what can we expect in the future? Will festivals hibernate until next year or will they try to keep the public interested by offering digital experiences? Will more players emerge that offer services for the digital dissemination of culture? I both hope and believe that this is the case. And I hope it will also spill over into the post-pandemic era. After all, there may well be both an audience and a willingness to pay if festivals, concerts and performances are also offered digitally to those who no longer want to travel, but would rather have experiences at home in their living room.