The challenge
Prototype and pilot an experience that increases sofa sales in 3 months.
The client has 18 stores in the spanish territory and is constantly experimenting with the format and concept of the stores, bringing a selection of products into city center. This experiment comes with challenges, such as not being able to show the full range of sofas in the smaller urban stores, where every square meter has a higher cost.
Ikea turned to us to design a solution that would help customers understand the wide range of sofas and drive an higher conversation rate from store;s foot traffic. The stakeholder was looking to increase sofa sales by 5% and prove that digital solutions can bring higher ROI than using every available square meter to display sofas.
The final solution we developed increased sofa sales by 9% in only one month.
Plan & Approach
4 months of design, in-context prototyping & development.
The project was performed in two main phases. In the first 2 months, we run stakeholder interviews and gathered objectives and success criteria, explored different directions and run ideation workshop to prioritize through different criteria including feasibility. We developed a concept and tested the experience. This became the foundation for improvements in the second phase, where we designed and developed the App Experience, and finalised the in-store experience. We tested and measured the impact through different KPIs and metrics.
Ikea turned to us to design a solution that would help customers understand the wide range of sofas and drive an higher conversation rate from store;s foot traffic. The stakeholder was looking to increase sofa sales by 5% and prove that digital solutions can bring higher ROI than using every available square meter to display sofas.
The final solution we developed increased sofa sales by 9% in only one month.
Immersion & Ideation
Co-creation sessions to ideate potential solutions.
A deep immersion process of competitor analysis, trendscraping, and friends and family research framed five macro opportunity areas. Followed by a co-creation session, together with the client we developed concepts that proposed new digital touchpoints and different in-store experiences. To decide which solution to implement, we used a prioritisation framework that took into account business and customer values, and implementation feasability.
The solution
The final solution was a multi-touchpoint experience to help at every point of the purchase experience.
The experience invites customers to discover new sofas that might not be available in store, by displaying dynamic content on a video wall, and tablet app helps them browse through sofas based on needs. Once the customer selects a few sofas options, they can send an email to save those items or move to purchase. The co-worker act as the sofa expert available when needed, and closes the sales.
Digital-physical prototyping
In-context prototyping to get feedback.
After the first pilot implementation and round of user feedback, the team worked on iterating the physical and digital solution. The space had to became more inviting and stand out from the monotony of the sofa sales floor, and the tablet app moved from a simple code prototype, to a fully-developed end to end experience to browse the whole IKEA sofa catalog.
First prototype ︎↓
Final version ↓
The digital experience
Focusing on customer needs to create a personalized digital experience.
The app was designed to match customer’s mental model instead of the client’s traditional sofa grouping model. On the app, customers can autonomously start searching for a sofa by answering two simple questions: how will they use their sofa and for how many people it should be. These questions filter the catalog based on simple needs, not product attributes, saving valuable time from the co-workers.
The digital experience – Wizard
A discovery experience that is based on real needs and preferences.
Our goal was to offer a different way to experience the discovery of the sofa. We identified the most common activities that people usually do on sofas, and connected them to the attributes already present in each sofa of the catalogue. During he wizard we wanted to give customers the possibility to also choose the number of seats or to insert specific dimension, which represent the 2 key initial drivers when you’re searching for a sofa.
The digital experience – Discovery
A detailed custom catalogue page, with advanced filters to refine the search.
The customers will see the recommended sofa that best meet their needs. The relation between activities and attributes is the key factor that personalized the discovery phase: for example, if the user choose “Eating and snacking” during the wizard, the characteristic “Wipeable” will be already selected as a filter. Advanced filters let the customers refine their search.
The digital experience – Purchase
Extend the experience to customers’ personal devices to complete the purchase.
Sometimes buying a sofa requires weeks, months. It was fundamental for us to find a way to extend the experience outside the store, and move to customers’ preferred and personal touchpoint. During the in-store experience, customers can add their products to a temporary wishlist, than later can be sent via email or saved through QR code.
Final outcome
A touchpoint thought for customers that became an employee tool.
The sales data showed an increase of sofa sales in pilot store within the first 2 weeks of the solution being implemented, and instead of being removed after a trial period, the client decided to keep it, since it was truly changing how they worked and how they sold sofas to customers. The solution has now been implemented in a smaller urban store.
“Our sales routine has been highly modified with this solution. Instead of walking around for 20 minutes with the customer, you can close it in 10 minutes on the tablet. You go straight ahead to what they want.”
– Sofa area manager, IKEA Alcorcón
