Interview with Thomas Wateau, lead developer at Business Tech

Hello Thomas,

If you agree, I want to ask you a few questions to help our customers understand how our company works behind the scene. Also we can talk about the working process you’re using every day.

So, let’s begin! What is your background ?

Thomas WateauHi Laurent,

I joined the Business Tech adventure in March 2012, almost 1 year of good memories.
My professional track was relatively undetermined until my university years. After choosing a scientific orientation in French seconde (10th grade in the US), I eventually got my Baccalaureate in Social Economy.
It is only later that I realized what I wanted to do, once I was admitted at the I.U.T. (Technological University Institute) in Nice, in their computer science department. I then got my Bachelor’s degree in “Multimedia and databases”. I highly recommend this program by the way.
I then quickly caught the web development virus.
The economic context from 2001 to 2002 did not allow me to immediately work in this field, but I got to acquire great experience by working for companies such as IBM and Steria.
Eventually, I got to do what I really enjoy and work in the field of my passion, with more great companies such as Monaco Telecom or Orange / France Telecom where I was a senior developer with an emphasis on back-office for almost 6 years.

What is your job at Business Tech ?

I’m a Senior Web Developer and Technical Lead. I’m also in charge of level 1 and 2 tech support.

Why did you choose Prestashop ?

PrestaShop is an excellent solution for small and medium-sized e-merchants, which represent the core of our target market as a module developer. It also has a few large companies among its clients, but they’re usually the exception rather than the rule. Very large merchants usually go for custom-made solutions or more expensive platforms such as Magento, Hybris or InterShop. As developers, PrestaShop is very pleasant to work with: it is flexible, powerful and accessible all at once, which makes development fast and relatively easy, and its learning curve as not as steep compared to the more complex solutions mentioned. As for merchants, the back-office is very easy to get acquainted with, and they can quickly start focusing on their core business: selling. Because of its simplicity, it also makes development cheaper and therefore represents a smaller investment for merchants getting started.

About Prestashop 1.5 : which challenges did you run into to make all Business Tech’s modules compatible ?

The main challenge was to identify all the new features and functionality and to track down the technical changes they implied.

Which specific difficulties did you face ?

The hardest part came from the fact that PrestaShop itself was still improving some features and the code was still changing quite a lot from one version to the next. All the special cases in the code coming from PrestaShop’s flexibility and new features was also challenging.

What would you say were the strengths of this new version ?

The new back-office, with a cleaner layout allowed for better ergonomics and a more intuitive usage. The menus have been rearranged in a more logical way.

Can you tell me more about the future of Business Tech’s PrestaShop modules ?

- Google Merchant Center
The integration of Google Adwords (advertising on Google). This will allow merchants to easily associate their Adwords campaigns to their product feed, and segment them. This will allow for much greater visibility.

- Facebook PS Shop Tab
We are thinking about adding in a little while some statistics reports that will allow merchants to better understand the impact of the module on their number of fans, Likes on products, as well as general traffic and clicks from the Facebook application to the main PrestaShop website.

- Google Rich Snippet + Product rating and reviews
This module’s incredible power has already been confirmed by our clients, but the new features and functionality will definitely position it as the absolute top module in its category: import of existing customer comments from PrestaShop’s native Comments module, a new visual “badge” with ratings average and other information to be displayed on the homepage, product category pages and product pages, as well as individual pages for each review to allow for better SEO and integration with social networks.

- Order and Tax Report
This module has by now reached its maturity, but we are still going to add a couple new reports : one for accounting purposes that will list returns / credit slips, as well as another one, with a CRM orientation and that will focus on customers. It will then be a very complete reporting module, essential to the success of any merchant, small or large.

Some of Business Tech’s modules have become free. Can you tell me more about this ?

We have indeed made the following modules free: “Ookoodoo”, “The Fancy” and “Used Products VAT Reports”. Ookoodoo is a universal wishlist service. The Fancy is the newest social network, with an emphasis on E-commerce. As for the last one, the name speaks for itself. These modules will no longer be developed or maintained as we prefer to focus our efforts on our best-selling modules.

What can you tell me about your tech support role ?

This role requires a few qualities: professionalism, good organizational skills, as well as a kind temper ;-) . We often deal with people who have little to no technical knowledge at all that don’t always have enough financial resources to get hep from a web agency. You really need to be patient with them and provide quality follow-through, even though we offer paid installation services for our modules.
One of the nice things about this job is that we have clients all over the world. So, of course, a good mastery of the English language is mandatory. But that allows us to be confronted with different cultures and to better understand e-commerce mechanics in each country.

What type of e-merchants do you meet when performing support ?

Most of the time, we deal with small merchants. Of course, we also get a fair share of “medium” or even large shops, some of them with catalogs containing several dozen thousand products.

Which problems do you most often face with these merchants ?

Quite often, it is their lack of technical knowledge and time spent explaining to them how PrestaShop itself works and its impact on our modules. It is therefore important for merchants to read the documentation included with each module carefully.

Thank you Thomas! I heard some rumors that Business tech earns more and more great reviews from our customers on AddOns and on our online shop, so a big Bravo because we all know that your job is not so easy!

Posted in Company news Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Interview avec Thomas Wateau, directeur du développement chez Business Tech

Bonjour Thomas,

si ça ne te dérange pas, je vais te poser quelques questions pour faire connaître l’envers du décor chez Business Tech et apporter quelques précisions sur notre travail et nos méthodes au quotidien. Surtout, comme c’est toi qui a le plus de contacts avec nos clients, cela leur permettra de connaître un peu mieux la personne qui fait tout pour leur apporter le meilleur service possible dès qu’ils ont acheté nos modules prestashop.

Quel est ton background ?

Thomas WateauBonjour Laurent,

J’ai commencé l’aventure avec Business Tech en Mars 2012, bientôt 1 an et déjà autant de bons souvenirs.
Mon parcours a été plutôt indécis jusqu’à l’université. Après m’être dirigé vers une filière scientifique en seconde, j’ai finalement eu mon BAC E.S (économie sociale).
C’est par la suite que la révélation est arrivée lorsque j’ai été admis à l’I.U.T de Nice en département informatique. De là, j’obtiens ma Licence Professionnelle en “Multimédia Réseau et Bases de données”. Une licence PRO que je recommande d’ailleurs.
Rapidement j’ai attrapé le virus du développement WEB.
Certes le contexte économique des années 2001 – 2002 ne m’a pas permis d’exercer cette spécialité au tout début mais cela m’a permis d’acquérir une grande expérience dans de grandes sociétés comme IBM et Steria.
Et heureusement pour moi cela a continué mais cette fois-ci dans le domaine de ma passion, avec de grandes sociétés comme Monaco Télécom et Orange FT où j’ai été développeur Senior Back-Office pendant 5 ans et demi.

Quel est ton rôle au sein de Business Tech ?

Développeur WEB Senior et Lead Technique. Je suis aussi en charge du support 1 & 2.

Pourquoi avez-vous choisi Prestashop ?

PrestaShop est une très bonne solution pour les petits et moyens e-commerçants, qui représentent notre cœur de cible en tant qu’éditeur de modules. La solution compte également quelques grands comptes, mais ces derniers ont quand même plutôt tendance à utiliser des solutions sur mesure ou plus onéreuses comme Magento, Hybris ou InterShop. En tant que développeur, PrestaShop est très agréable, car la solution est à la fois souple, puissante et accessible et rend les développements rapides et aisés, avec une courbe d’apprentissage plus courte que sur les solutions plus complexes. Et en ce qui concerne les marchands, le back-office est facile à prendre en main et, de par la rapidité des développements, représente un investissement moins important pour les marchands qui se lancent.

Concernant Prestashop 1.5, quels ont été les défis pour faire migrer les modules de Business Tech?

Le principal défi a été d’identifier les nouvelles grandes fonctionnalités et de voir jusqu’à quel point techniquement les variations étaient importantes.

Quelles sont les difficultés que tu as rencontrées ?

Cela a été d’identifier les points particuliers que Prestashop eux-mêmes étaient entrain d’améliorer :) . Cela a été aussi la multitude de cas particulier que l’on peut retrouver avec la flexibilité que Prestashop a rajouté dans ses fonctionnalités.

Quelles sont les points forts de cette nouvelle version ?

Un visuel grandement amélioré en Back-office a permis une ergonomie et une utilisation beaucoup plus intuitive. Les menus ont été réarrangés de façon cognitive.

Peux-tu nous parler des évolutions futures des modules Prestashop de Business Tech ?

- Google Merchant Center
L’intégration des Adwords (campagnes de pubs Google). Cela permettra aux marchands d’associer très facilement leur campagne à leur flux de données. La visibilité des produits en sera grandement améliorée.

- Facebook PS Shop Tab
Nous pensons ajouter d’ici quelques temps des fonctions de statistiques qui permettront au marchand de mieux connaitre l’impact du module sur le nombre de fans gagnés sur sa page Facebook, les Like des produits, et des stats généralistes sur les pages visitées et les liens cliqués vers la boutique PrestaShop

- Google Rich Snippet + Product rating and reviews
La puissance de ce module était déjà avérée mais les nouvelles fonctionnalités vont asseoir sa suprématie dans son domaine. L’importation des commentaires existant du module de Prestashop “product comments”. L’ajout de badge sur la page d’accueil et sur les pages catégories + les snippets. Un affichage individuel pour les notes et avis permettra un meilleur effet SEO et une intégration plus puissante avec les réseaux sociaux.

- Order and Tax Report
Ce module est à présent arrivé à sa maturité, mais nous allons tout de même rajouter 2 nouveaux rapports : un purement comptable qui permettra au marchand de lister les avoirs émis aux clients, et un, axé CRM, qui se concentrera sur les clients. Ce sera alors un outil très complet de reporting, indispensable pour tous les marchands, peu importe leur taille.

Certains modules de Business Tech sont devenus des modules gratuits, peux-tu nous parler d’eux?

Nous avons rendu gratuits les modules « Ookoodoo », « The Fancy » et « Rapports de TVA produits d’occasion ». Ookoodoo est un réseau social de liste cadeaux universelle. The Fancy est le nouveau réseau social du E-commerce. Quant au dernier, tout est dans le titre. Ces modules ne seront plus développés ni maintenus car nous préférons concentrer nos efforts sur nos meilleurs modules.

Tu m’as aussi dit que tu étais en charge aussi du support des modules prestashop de Business Tech, à ce titre, que peux-tu nous apprendre sur cette mission ?

Oui tout à fait. Ce rôle incombe d’avoir les qualités de sérieux, rigueur et jovialité. Il faut savoir que nous avons souvent à faire à des personnes peu technique et qui n’ont pas toujours les moyens d’avoir une agence web en suivi, ce qui a pour effet de devoir être patient, et de savoir faire des efforts de suivi bien que nous proposons des services d’installation ;)
Un des attraits de ce poste est que nous avons des clients dans le monde entier. Bien sûr, l’anglais est indispensable ;) mais cela nous permet d’être confronter aux différentes cultures et ainsi de mieux comprendre le e-commerce dans chaque pays.

Quels sont les profils des propriétaires de boutiques en ligne Prestashop que ton équipe et toi rencontrez en support ?

Le plus souvent le profil est celui de petit marchand. Bien évidemment, il y a une minorité somme toute importante considérée comme étant des moyennes boutiques avec des catalogues avoisinant plusieurs dizaines de milliers de produits.

Quels sont les problèmes les plus récurrents de ces personnes ?

Bien souvent, c’est le manque de connaissances techniques et le temps passé afin se familiariser avec leur boutique.

Bien évidemment cela sous-entend de bien suivre les recommandations que nous pouvons mettre dans l’interface de nos modules et dans nos documentations ;) .

Merci Thomas, et bonne continuation, je crois savoir de source sûre que le support de Business Tech obtient toujours plus de notes maximales sur le support d’AddOns ainsi que sur notre boutique, alors un grand bravo !

Posted in Company news Leave a comment

Business Tech recrute un technico-commercial pour son support client

Mission

De profil technico-commercial, vous serez rattaché(e) à notre direction et celle de nos partenaires situés dans le département des Bouches du Rhône (13), afin de gérer les demandes d’assistance à l’installation ou à la configuration des modules PrestaShop que nous éditons, ainsi que de conseiller et de proposer des solutions adaptées à leur e-business. Le poste est situé à Marseille.

En plus de l’activité de support classique, vous saurez vous montrer force de propositions face aux clients, et serez à même d’augmenter le chiffre d’affaires généré par nos modules en profitant de chaque contact établi via le support pour conseiller et amener le client à commander des modules complémentaires et adaptés à leur activité. Un bon contact avec la clientèle – française comme internationale – est donc essentiel.

Permis : A et/ou B requis

Compétences

  • Parfaite maîtrise à l’utilisation de Prestashop
  • Anglais lu, écrit et parlé impératif
  • Maîtrise des langages HTML, CSS et JavaScript
  • Connaissance de base de PHP et MySQL
  • Très bon sens relationnel
  • Débrouillardise et capacité à comprendre instinctivement le fonctionnement des technologies
  • Une bonne organisation
  • Une expérience de support par téléphone serait un plus

Lieu du poste: Marseille (Métro Castellane)
Lieu de la formation continue: Aix en Provence et Sophia Antipolis

Comment postuler ?

Merci d’envoyer vos candidatures par mail à: dniry [at] businesstech [dot] fr

Posted in Company news Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Google Rich Snippets + Product Ratings and Reviews & Facebook PS Wall Posts available for PrestaShop 1.5

It’s finally here ! Our hottest PrestaShop module, Google Rich Snippets + Product Ratings & Reviews, is now fully compatible with PrestaShop versions 1.2 to 1.5. We have also added a killer feature: voucher codes. You can now, if you wish, choose to encourage your customers to review your products and reward them by offering them a small voucher for each review they post. And, if you have also installed our Facebook PS Wall Posts module and activated posting of reviews to your Facebook fan page, you can also, optionally, give them a second voucher for then sharing the post on your Facebook fan page on their own Facebook wall !

When you activate these features, the review form on your product pages will display these benefits to all your customers to drive engagement, and the configurable reminder and publication confirmation e-mails that go out will also empahasize these benefits to them (there are 11 types of preformatted e-mails to fit all the possible module configurations). All of this is of course fully configurable, with many useful options.

Conclusion: These 2 modules together constitute a nitrocharged social review system with no equivalent on the market. Competing products are plenty, but no one has ever pushed the details so far !

Facebook PS Wall Posts

We just mentioned the amazing interactions this module brings by combining it with Google Rich Snippets, so no need to repeat ourselves here. As a simple reminder, Facebook PS Wall Posts on it own allows you to post your new products and restock updates automatically on your Facebook page, and also allows you to manually post any product, product category or brand very easily in just a couple of clicks.

Posted in PrestaShop, PrestaShop modules Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Réponse à “PrestaShop en excès de vitesse” sur le blog de la E-Commerce Academy

Bonjour Fabrice,

C’est avec grand intérêt que j’ai lu votre article et force est de constater que l’avez rédigé avec application et structure. Je suis par ailleurs d’accord avec vous sur certains points.

Comme New Quest, Axome et Profileo, je fais également partie de l’écosystème PrestaShop. Business Tech est une agence certifiée “argent”, mais aussi un des plus importants développeurs de modules Prestashop. En tant que tel, c’est n’est pas à quelques dizaines de clients que nous avons eu affaire en 3 ans de collaboration avec PrestaShop, mais plutôt à des centaines. Pas loin de 2000 à l’heure actuelle pour être exact. Ce qui nous permet d’observer tous les jours des boutiques de toutes tailles et de tout genre.

Avant PrestaShop et notre ralliement en 2009, nous avons (comme beaucoup) travaillé avec des solutions comme osCommerce, et avons également évalué un panel de solutions comme Magento, VirtueMart sur Joomla (argh), OpenCart…

Bien qu’ayant décidé récemment d’abandonner l’activité d’agence classique et de nous concentrer sur l’édition de modules, nous continuons également d’accompagner un certain nombre de clients historiques, et ce depuis 2009. L’un de ces clients est une des toutes premières “grosses” boutiques PrestaShop aux USA, creedboutique.com (marque de parfums de luxe Franco-Britannique datant de 1760), boutique sur laquelle nous sommes entièrement rémunérés à la commission depuis le début.

Les présentations étant faites, je souhaitais donc simplement apporter notre retour d’expérience à partir du terrain. Pour rester cohérent, je vais reprendre la structure de votre article.

Continue reading

Posted in Business analysis and strategy, PrestaShop Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments

Our partner Presta-Module launches its Cache Manager module for PrestaShop

Cache manager module for PrestaShop I’m pretty sure everyone reading this post already knows who Presta-Module is… For those who don’t, they are one of the 2 top sellers and best PrestaShop module developers on the platform, along with us.

Just like us, they craft their modules with great attention to detail and a very strong emphasis on quality. Some of their best-sellers include Advanced Top Menu, Ads & Slideshow as well as Advanced Search.

Their latest release, Cache Manager, is due to become a best-seller as well, as improving the overall speed of one’s online shop is extremely important, for 2 reasons:

  • Visitors don’t have much patience these days, and a slow website will inevitably turn them off and send them shopping somewhere else.
  • Search engines such as Google take your website’s speed into consideration, and faster websites rank better. Therefore it also helps your SEO.

So, wait no longer… Go get it now on http://bit.ly/Rh18s5 !

Posted in PrestaShop, PrestaShop modules Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Google Merchant Center and Facebook PS Essentials modules available for PrestaShop 1.5

Our PrestaShop 1.5 module upgrade series continues… This week, you get two at the same time:

Google Merchant Center module for PrestaShop

Google Merchant Center

Many of you have been waiting for this one. It is now fully compatible from versions 1.2 to 1.5. As usual, we also added a couple improvements:

  • Simplification of the configuration interface with some preferences now automatically set
  • We added a setting so the number of products per AJAX and CRON cycle can be modified. This will help the larger shops with big catalogs.

 

Facebook PS Essentials module for PrestaShopFacebook PS Essentials

PrestaShop’s best Facebook widgets and social networks sharing toolbox is now also 1.5 compatible and benefited from a couple touch-ups:

  • Vertical share button with counter for Twitter was added
  • The code was optimized for better loading of Facebook widgets

That’s it for now. Both updated modules are available right now on our own module shop and will be online shortly on PrestaShop Addons (we are just waiting for their validation).

Next week, Facebook PS Wall Posts and our Facebook PS Ultimate Pack should be ready as well, and Google Rich Snippets + Product Ratings and Reviews will follow shortly after.

We will also soon share our experience and what we have learned over the last few weeks from this upgrade process, and publish a technical article with the things that have really changed in PrestaShop 1.5 as well as a few tips on how to make “old” modules (initially built on PrestaShop 1.2 or 1.3) compatible all the way to 1.5 without rewriting everything or writing 2 separate modules.

Stay tuned !

Posted in PrestaShop, PrestaShop modules Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Facebook PS Shop Tab now available for PrestaShop 1.5, and some new and exciting features !

Facebook PS Shop Tab module for PrestaShopThe entire PrestaShop Addons community has been working hard over the last few weeks getting acquainted with PrestaShop 1.5 and migrating its modules so they will be compatible with this exciting new release. We are no exception.

We are pleased to announce that the first of our modules, Facebook PS Shop Tab, is now fully compatible with PrestaShop from version 1.2.1 to 1.5.1, including with the multishop capability.

We have also added a few nice features to the module, which we think you will enjoy:

  • “Fan-gating” capability: you can now activate fan-gating on your Shop Tab. This means that people will not be able to see the contents of your mini-shop on your Facebook page unless they have first liked your page. Instead, they will see a replacement image, which you can upload from the module back-office. This is a great way to quickly increase your fan base !
  • Google Analytics tracking: Many of you have asked for this in the past, it is now here. Simply copy / paste your Analytics site ID (e.g. UA-12345678) into the appropriate field in the module config, and boom, visits to your Shop Tab will now be tracked just like on your regular PrestaShop website.
  • Brands can now be browsed as well: Another often requested feature: the top menu in Shop Tab can now include a “Brands” link. Clicking this link will display a page with all your brand names and their logos in a neat grid format. Clicking a logo or brand name will display the corresponding products.

Its is available right now on PrestaShop Addons (http://bit.ly/OHrAyx) and our own module shop (http://bit.ly/PBG8RE).

The next module to be migrated within the next 10 days will be our other best-seller: Google Merchant Center. Stay tuned !

Posted in PrestaShop, PrestaShop modules Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

The Modular Approach, The E-merchant’s Dimensions & Metrics: Thoughts on the E-commerce Platforms and Addons Industry

The Modular Approach

All major existing e-commerce solutions have chosen this path: a main “core” solution, complemented by a large selection of downloadable smaller programs that extend the core functionality.

It’s a great ecosystem. To a certain extent, one could argue that the entire software industry (Operating Systems and Software Applications) as well as Mobile (Apple and Android) App Stores and even Facebook (and its upcoming own new App Store) have used the same approach.

But when it comes to e-commerce platforms and their “addons”, “modules” and “extensions” (the name varies according to the platform), there is one specific expression that, as a PrestaShop module developer ourselves, we keep hearing from our e-merchant clients, small and large alike: “It’s a jungle out there”.

Many simply do not know which modules are right for them and often purchase and install modules without fully understanding how they will concretely impact their bottom line. And the marketplaces that sell them often lack in structure and categorization to adequately guide and advise merchants through the process of purchasing the right solutions for them.

Continue reading

Posted in Business analysis and strategy 5 Comments

Business Tech @ Barcamp 5 NYC

Business Tech is pleased to announce that we will be attending the PrestaShop Barcamp in New York City as one of the exhibitors and sponsors !

We will be doing a client testimonial presentation with our client www.creedboutique.com and the event will be, as usual, rich with conferences, workshops, presentations, interactions with the PrestaShop team and much more !

The location will be quite spectacular, right in the middle of Soho, on Mercer Street:

The easiest way to get there is by subway, on the 6, A, C, E, N or R line stopping at Prince St. or Spring St.

Seating will be limited at what promises to be an exceptional event, so make sure to book early to reserve your spot !

The Barcamp NYC information, program and reservation form are available on http://barcamp.prestashop.com - So get your FREE PASS now !

Be sure to visit our booth in the main exhibition area. We will be presenting our latest modules, including one which has been kept Top Secret and will be officially presented for the first time at the event !

Posted in PrestaShop Leave a comment