2015 Silver Retail

LIDA

IKEA

Welcome to Älmhult

The Team
Nicky Bullard, Spencer White, Andy O’Carroll, Nick Vassou, Giovanni Spagnoli, Pratomchai Pusakolcharoensa, Jon Chandler, Mark Harrison, Chris Cannacott, Mily Williamson, Oliver Mate, Emily Rorrison, Josephine Ross

Contributors
Unit9 - Producer/ Director, Smoke and Mirrors - Post Production, ToolShed Music - Audio Post Production

Campaign overview

While much loved, IKEA is a place many people only visit occasionally. The brand needed to make new IKEA FAMILY members feel super-welcome and immerse them in the brand from the off because, if they feel special, they are more likely to keep their IKEA FAMILY cards in their wallets and purses and visit a store more often.

A highly personalised film and interactive behind-the-scenes tour around IKEA’s Älmhult headquarters provided an exclusive experience that made new members feel welcome and drove increased engagement and store visits.

Strategy

IKEA FAMILY isn’t a points based programme. Benefits include a free cuppa, invitations to inspirational workshops and offers that help members make their home their own. While active members say they love being part of IKEA FAMILY, others sign up in-store to get an offer and never put the card in their wallet.

Analysis showed the first three months was a critical period in which to drive a reinforcing visit and card swipe. Qualitative research showed how to create a better relationship through gifting, personalisation and multi-channel strategy.

Small gifts had proven effective at driving visits, so members were given a choice of welcome gift online to pick it up in-store. The brand promise was made more personal to improve results. And where customers opted-in to mail only, they were encouraged to experience something wonderful online to change their mind.

Creativity

To give each member the warmest possible welcome, IKEA created a film designed just for them. Inviting them into its own Älmhult home, at every point the experience was made as engaging as possible.

Personalisation techniques included IKEA’s man in Älmhult, Lars, using the customer’s name and referencing where they live.

Pioneering webcam motion tracking technology let members tour the factory just by looking left or right.

Speech recognition let members practise saying IKEA the proper way (“ee-keh-ah”), with Lars’ feedback. Lars would offer tea or coffee, pour a cup accordingly, ask which free gift they’d like, chat through membership benefits and introduce product stories and the principles of democratic design, alongside real IKEA designers. In the test lab, IKEA proved the quality of its products in a very fun way.

Results

By putting the new member at the centre of this unique welcome, early results showed them increasingly putting IKEA FAMILY at the centre of their purses and wallets.

High engagement rates proved that investment in personalisation, as well as the highly innovative ‘look left and right’ motion tracking technology, will pay back. While face tracking and audio tracking have been used in marketing communications before, this combination of the two is something new.

This has helped support IKEA’s desire to keep its customers engaged and excited – with 61% saying the campaign made IKEA more surprising to them and 65% reporting they would visit IKEA more often as a result.