The end client is a leading European online travel booking company.
Requirement
To develop a rich media viral microsite that would encourage registration and this data capture and also drive traffic to the end client’s websites.
Key functional elements included:
- An entirely Flash front end displaying user selected Flash video which was then sent to friends as the core content of the site
- A user registration and send to friend module to drive site traffic
- The option for users to upload images to create UGC for the site
- Detailed reporting on the traffic and registrations accessed via a custom admin module
Technical Solution
The site was developed using Flash CS3 as the front end integrated with a PHP and MySQL backend.
Data was passed between the Flash via XML generated on the fly.
The site was hosted on a cluster of four servers; 2 web and 2 DB replicating in real time with load balancing between them to ensure a resilient hosting platform.
Project Mechanics
The project ran for 6 weeks from initial planning to launch. Some key stages of the project included:
- Building Flash/PHP functionality to allow users to select from a pre-defined set of variables to assemble a series of video clips to be played back seemingly as a single video
- Developing a bespoke Flash video player to load multiple FLV’s concurrently to ensure the final video playback was seamless
- Integrating optional user picture file upload functionality with the ability for site administrators to select pictures from these to be displayed on the main site
- Creating a custom reporting module to allow site administrators to easily gauge site traffic and user registrations
- Implementing a fully redundant short term custom hosting solution based on the agency’s site traffic predictions
Conclusion
We have extensive experience in developing solutions that integrate rich media with databases and bespoke functionality in both .net and PHP.
For this project we were able to offer a turn-key solution of both the development and specialist hosting required for the projected user traffic.
Our deep understanding of how to deliver video into a dynamic environment combined with our experience in creating microsites ensured that we were able to deliver a site that did all that the agency and end client expected for their viral campaign.
Tags: Flash, PHP
