Dan LaCivita began his career at Firstborn as a full-time Flash developer where he was responsible for programming many of Firstborn’s awardwinning projects. As one of the lead developers on projects such as Burger King’s The Sith Sense, Victoria’s Secret, Atlantis, Dasani, Björk, CORZO, The 4400, VH1 and Ralph Lauren, LaCivita now brings his Flash expertise to his role as executive producer. He has already worked on many highprofile projects including Malibu Rum, Nationwide Insurance, Smirnoff, Stride Gum, Food TV and Lee Jeans. His background in advertising, coupled with his extensive Flash knowledge, allows LaCivita to not only manage a project every step of the way, but fully understand his clients’ needs from both a creative and technical point of view.

WD: Do you think we now understand what the DNA of good eCommerce design is?

DL: I think as consumer needs and technology evolves, our understanding of good eCommerce design has to evolve as well. I think we are at a point now where we have the tools to create well thought-out and successful eCommerce sites, but there will (and should) be room for improvement.

WD: Could you give us two examples of what you consider to be excellent eCommerce design?

DL: Shop Composition (www.shopcomposition.com) and John Varvatos Fragrance (www.johnvarvatosscent.com) are good examples. Both of these sites are full Flash sites, with all the eCommerce taking place right in the Flash experience. Shop Composition, although created in Flash, has an intuitive navigation system where users can easily sort through products in a variety of ways. The biggest draw is the huge beauty shots of all the products. It’s almost better than being in the store – you can see the textures and almost feel each object in their true form. Instead of small thumbnails, it gives the user a great insight into the product they’re about to purchase. The shopping cart is also simple but intuitive. Items added to your cart are displayed with small icons (to see how many you have) and you can go back and click the icons to view the full-sized product shots.

John Varvatos Fragrance is a site we created here at Firstborn that we’re pretty proud of. Obviously, one of the things you lose in eCommerce shopping is the sense of being in the store. An eCommerce site for a fragrance is particularly challenging because you’re working with a sense we have yet to express perfectly (in the context that it mirrors reality) in the digital world – the sense of smell. So, the goal here was to create an experience that tapped into the user’s emotions, as well as create a site that was easy to navigate with a simple checkout process. We used audio clips in the fragrance notes section, so the user could interact with images as well as listen to the history and reasons behind each fragrance note.

WD: Are there any lessons that eCommerce sites can learn from real-world retailing that are not being embraced at the moment?

DL: I think the key is creating that emotional connection with the user. What you lose in eCommerce is the sense of trying things on, touching and smelling them, speaking to a salesperson. But, those things can also get in the way of a person’s shopping experience. Sometimes people (who are getting busier and busier every day!) just want to go online and make a purchase. I think it is striking the balance between those areas that makes for a successful eCommerce site.

WD: Can you outline any golden rules of eCommerce design?

DL: Treat each user like a salesperson would treat a customer walking into their store. Greet them and make them feel at home. Make sure their shopping experience is simple, things are accessible and most importantly, make it fun for them to spend money. The more fun they have, the more money they will spend.

WD: What effect – if any – do you think Web 2.0 technologies are having on eCommerce?

DL: Well, things like AJAX and other 2.0 technologies are great when you are not using Flash as the front-end deployment technology. At Firstborn, I would say 90 per cent of the development we do uses Flash for the front end. So things like AJAX are great, but it is only accomplishing things that Flash has been doing for years now.

WD: Do you think that in the eCommerce field, innovative design and commerce can go together or are they mutually exclusive?

DL: They can absolutely go together. Design is the art of solving problems in an elegant way. Each eCommerce site (or any site for that matter) will have different problems to solve, and because of that will need different design and technology solutions. The thing to remember is that any new technologies are a tool – a means to an end (making a sale) as opposed to an end in themselves. There is always room to improve – both on the larger scale of things as well as in the details. Basing sites off of successful models could be a smart, albeit safe practice… but the best eCommerce site has yet to be designed.