Personalised consumerism as we know it today is the result of years and years of economic and technological changes and discoveries. The first concept of a personalised product has its roots just before the Industrial Revolution, when in the absence of mass production technology, people were, basically handcrafting everything, so the chances of something not being personalised were almost none. Soon after, technological advances have enabled big manufacturers to produce identical products, using a pattern, on cheaper prices so everybody migrated to this option. This phenomenon is known as mass-consumerism. The years between 1950’s and 1960’s have been crucial for the economy of scale and the mass manufacturing concept. The globalisation trend has enabled manufacturers to expand their activities on foreign markets, which had a direct impact on the amount of goods being produced. In the 1980’s, the consumer got bored of having the same looking product as everyone else and the concept of personalisation has been introduced.
From standard to custom
On a study conducted by Deloitte UK in 2015, 1 in 5 respondents affirmed that they would pay 20% more for a personalised item compared to a standard one. On the other hand, the same survey shows that only 42% of the consumers are keen on letting the brands propose the personalised options. The findings suggest that people are likely to offer more for a personalised product or service, but also expect to be tailored to their needs.
Customisation vs Personalisation
The software market has experienced the same change in buying behaviour, even more dynamically once with the introduction of custom made apps. It has become a norm for companies to develop custom build solutions for clients willing to pay the price. As an extension of the personalisation concept, the customisation idea has been created. Although, the vast majority of people don’t quite know the difference between customisation and personalisation, both concepts are looked for by customers from all sectors. In the customisation process, the user is expected to share his needs and expectations, while for personalisation, the company will adjust its offering based on the segment the client is part of, by predicting his interest.
Tailor-fit solutions, better results.
Here, at XWiki, we like to think about ourselves as a flexible company that produces custom based solutions, starting from a standard software, in order to tailor-fit each feature to the client’s exact purpose. Starting with understanding the specific needs of each particular organisation, we are able to adjust the highly customisable wiki, to meet even the most exigent expectations. During the past projects we have received favorable feedback as all our clients have experienced better performances. The most common are considered to be a higher level of efficiency and collaboration compared to the organisations implementing the generic software. Moreover, the same project was able to reduce the operating costs caused by bad data and weak communication within the organisation.
Our solutions
We are proud to underline two projects which required complex custom features that have been implemented on top of the XWiki’s default software:
The L’Union Sociale Pour L’Habitat resource centre is a customised knowledge database developed for a French government related confederation dedicated to supporting low income families. The design and UI are part of the customisation process, but the complex part consists in creating a special document structure on which using a customized workflow, juridic specialists are able to create and edit content. On top of that, the organization asked for a custom metadata filter which is able to sort documents based on some special characteristics.
The second example consists in a corporate intranet, developed for one of the top suppliers of electric energy in Brazil. Being used by more than 5000 users located in several cities, the solution has received a custom SSO login as well as a statistics tracking feature.
Customising a complex software in such a manner to meet the exact expectations is a challenge for both the technical and the design departments. Furthermore, getting custom features to function on a standard wiki solution requires communication between the client and the company, strong interdepartmental collaboration and lastly, but by no means least highly knowledgeable specialists, all this being able to be found at XWiki.
If you want to know more about our projects, check the References page or discover the USH business case.
George Nikolic
Marketing Specialist @ XWiki
