iO - Discover infinite opportunities
Storyblok is the first headless CMS that works for developers & marketers alike.
Thinking big, working locally: iO is a growing team of experts providing end-to-end services for communication and digital transformation in Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, Denmark, and Bulgaria. Based on strategy, creation and content, marketing, and technology, iO works with customers to strengthen their brand, improve digital systems, and provide future-proof growth.
iO: Everything in one place
It’s no secret that organizations today have to operate in a fast-changing market where one has to be quick and adaptive but also innovative and future-focused. The question is: How can that be done? Well, with the help of an end-to-end agency like iO. Their goal is to help organizations discover and exploit the infinite opportunities offered by a constantly changing market. Whether it’s building a brand, future-proofing a business, maintaining a digital ecosystem, or achieving smart growth: their experts are always ready to help organizations achieve their goals.
When asked about the approach to clients, iO’s team tells us that their aim is to be as invisible as possible in their projects. In other words, they put the spotlight on the client and the client’s brand identity becomes all that matters. What is even more fascinating is that the team at iO likes to challenge their clients in a healthy way to help them find the new opportunities that best fit their brand, their target audiences, and their organization.
At the end of the day, what makes iO truly unique is their end-to-end offering: They give their clients the opportunity to work with one partner for all their challenges in marketing, technology, strategy, and content. This scale and way of working allow them to switch quickly and service organizations in a way that competing agencies wouldn’t be able to offer.
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Discovering Storyblok
We couldn't agree more with iO’s observation that a growing number of organizations are adopting a composable or MACH approach to their digital structure, incorporating best-of-breed technologies into their tech stack, an approach that iO is a strong believer in. This also means that the demand for adopting headless Content Management Systems (CMS) is also growing.
As iO started looking for a CMS solution to help satisfy the rising demand for a headless CMS, they did not settle for anything. They were looking for a solution that would provide an excellent developer experience, which they were able to find easily. However, they also needed a solution that could deliver an amazing content editing experience, which is where Storyblok came to the rescue.
Storyblok is a good product that designers, developers, and content editors love. Storyblok is an excellent example that can be used to demo this new generation of headless CMS.
The team at iO enjoys the fact that Storyblok adds value to their technology stack of choice as it integrates with systems like CRM, MarTech, Commerce, PIM, etc. So far, they have used Storyblok in combination with their partners, and Storyblok partners: Shopware, BigCommerce, commercetools, Hubspot and Algolia, and more. With (micro)services on AWS/Azure, the iO team finds it easy to handle any customization using the webhooks and API Storyblok offers.
When asked about the main reasons why iO has chosen to work with Storyblok, here is what the team told us:
For iO, being able to solve content previewing & component design in a headless solution, having the ability to work with modern frontend frameworks, the CMS’s easy setup, and the pricing model were the main drivers for going with Storyblok. Moreover, the team behind Storyblok is eager to grow together with us.
Case Study: iO revitalizes Pode's online presence to achieve a cohesive brand experience
iO has added the legendary Dutch furniture brand Pode to the list of organizations that have switched to headless by creating their new website. Pode’s goal with iO was to create a harmonious, cohesive journey for their consumers, giving them the same inspiration through an online experience. As a furniture design brand, Pode felt it was vital to translate the brand experience, authenticity, and feel digitally to the online consumer. From the very first briefing, Pode was clear that they wanted the online visitor to get the same experience as being in the physical showroom.
By combining Storyblok with Next.js, iO manages to create exactly what they had envisioned for this project. Achieving this dream was made easier by the fact that Storyblok and Next.js are highly compatible. Due to Storyblok’s headless structure, iO could really focus on the frontend, which was reinforced by Storyblok’s SaaS properties. This pairing allowed iO to bring to life a renewed Pode experience built just as they’d imagined.
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Building iO’s website with Storyblok
Storyblok Agency Partners have the opportunity to leverage a free forever Teams Plan license to build their agency website with Storyblok and we are extremely happy that iO was able to take advantage of this partner benefit and build their beautiful website with the help of our CMS.
We make use of the free partner license and extend it when needed. It is great to make use of this benefit while giving our colleagues the space to explore possibilities from a new partnership and platform. Moreover, the fact we use it (Storyblok) ourselves, in a complex set-up, helps build trust with new customers.
The frontend of iO’s website is built in Next.js with GraphQL as the query language. The entire project is also built in Typescript and iO use GraphQL codegen to ensure typesafety. In addition, iO use Tailwind as a CSS library, and they create their components in Storybook. Due to the headless architecture of the site, they also had the ability to implement Recruitee, which provides all the vacancy data on the jobs section, as well as Hubspot, which takes care of all the forms on the site.
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Storyblok and iO also partner on marketing and sales initiatives. Both iO and Storyblok’s marketing departments collaborate on many joint campaigns.
Partner of the Month
Storyblok and iO have a partnership for mutual growth as we enjoy working together. We are proud to be partners and friends with an organization and a team that works hard to strengthen their customer’s brands, improve their digital systems, and provide future-proof growth.
We are happy to announce that iO is Storyblok’s November Partner of the Month! You can get in touch with them by visiting their website or by visiting their Partner listing.
