Web designer, web integrator…
These are job titles that now seem a little, perhaps entirely, outdated.
Back around 1997–98, we called this work “multimedia designer-developer”.
We searched on AOL; websites were built with tables for 800 × 600 screens. We scanned photos, tutorials existed only in books, Google had not yet been born, and Amazon sold only books.
I lived through all of it.
We had to race to keep up with constant, sometimes exponential, change: new languages, tools, methods and habits. I did it with passion.
But one thing has not really changed: the client.
I have worked with hundreds: communications agencies, travel agencies, hoteliers, shopkeepers, photographers, craftspeople and estate agents…
The conclusion was always the same: whatever the technology, clients want things to be simple.
From a small WordPress site set up in an hour to a PrestaShop or Shopify store developed over six months, the need is still the same:
- To understand;
- To be able to use it;
- Not to become an IT specialist just to manage a website.
That is the great paradox of our work: technology has become incredibly powerful, while the solutions offered to professionals have grown ever more complex.
You have to manage the CMS, plugins, payments, shipping, taxes, emails, SEO, customer accounts, updates… and now AI.
AI will certainly help professionals. But it will not change one fundamental truth: a professional is not a web expert.
Their work is their customers, products or services. They need to sell, make, deliver, invoice and keep their business running.
That is exactly the insight behind Torlann.
Not to create yet another miracle solution, or replace one complicated ecosystem with another. Just to get back to basics: an online shop should remain a tool that serves the business owner.
- Catalogue, orders, payments, shipping and Click & Collect;
- quote requests and, above all, direct conversations with customers.
All within WordPress, with one plugin and one interface.
Torlann is designed for small businesses, craftspeople, shopkeepers and independent professionals who want to sell or showcase products without making life harder.
The project is still in development, and there is plenty left to refine.
But after all these years watching the web evolve, this is probably the most important lesson I have learned:
The best technology is not the one that lets you do the most. It is the one that makes it simple to do what you need.
That is the ambition behind Torlann.
Because, in the end… The web has changed, but the world is still the same.