A reflection of IFA 2019 from the Human-Centered Design approach
The purpose of this report is to identify how the approaches of design thinking and human-centered design are helping electronic brands to shape design experiences in the context of IFA’s trade show. IFA is the largest consumer tech conference in Europe that showcases the upcoming launches from some of the worlds biggest brands.
Every year brands and design agencies team up to create booth designs that are thought to be unique and to offer remarkable experiences to their visitors. Design agencies are confronted with an extensive number of challenges that need to be solved by applying the expertise of many design disciplines.
How to present the brand in a specific space?
How to communicate and be unique?
How to shape experiences that involve emotional stories?
How to provide experiences with innovative technology?
Even though the questions before are repeatedly mentioning the word experience and implicitly targeting the user it is important to mention that the practical uses of HCD to the professional field of space design are still rare. So far, only IBM has proved to use the method to reimagine its trade show experience as a conversation, rather than a one-way monologue. This approach has helped them to foster deeper relationships with customers and to learn how IBM could better solve their dynamic problems.
The absence of practical applications to spatial design brings up discussions that challenge the boundaries of design thinking but they are at the same time opening an opportunity to explore how the methodology could lead to innovations that fulfill the specific needs for brands at the trade shows.
Regarding this new design strategic approach at MDLab, IFA was an opportunity to understand how brands are solving booth design challenges and how are they making use of the space to engage visitors in user-centered design experiences. Moreover, it was important to understand the reason why brands are still interested in participating in this kind of trade shows.
Trade shows are an opportunity to strengthen B2B and B2C relationships and booth spaces are allowing brands to bring features from different space design typologies all at once. At IFA, brands are putting together lifestyle scenarios, hands-on experiences, live demonstrations and staff for consultation with the purpose to engage the user in many different levels.
How are brands engaging visitors through user experiences at IFA?
IFA is a trade show for brands to showcase electronic home appliances. The experiences are focusing on letting visitors try, touch and interact with a range of different products. Booths are usually divided into zones that display appliances depending on the area of the home where they are used. This means the general spatial distribution of a booth has a living room, a laundry section, and a kitchen.
Brands are using the same type of experiences to provide information about their products. For example, it was common to see the simulation of lifestyle scenarios such as living rooms so users were able to interact with tv screens, smart home devices, light sensors, audio devices, and vacuum cleaners. On the other hand, washing machines and tumble dryers were usually offering sensorial experiences in which visitors could compare how the washing cycles affected the fabrics of a specific garment. Furthermore, many brands held live shows with professional chefs to demonstrate the performance of kitchen products.
Other types of experiences that were subtle but still interesting were the deck of cards across the Philips booth. They used them to invite visitors to have a drink at their Coffee bar and in there conversations with the staff were held in a more relaxed way.
Finally, is worth to mention the approach that Philips has made with its booth design this year at IFA. The experience was easy to remember because it was overwhelming. They came up with a spatial distribution that contained at least 15 hand-on experiences. The staff was talkative and dynamic. The booth was loud, colourful and active. When visitors walked around they could see people brushing their teeth, cutting their hair or shaving their beard.
The idea behind the big noise of the Philips booth was to transform experiences into a collection of tokens that at the end of IFA would be converted into money and donated to a social cause.
To conclude, innovative user experiences were limited at IFA 2019. Brands are used to display their products in a certain way so it is easy to identify patterns across the trade show. Design thinking offers a new mindset for brands and a set of tools for design teams that can efficiently help to reimagine these types of user engagement. Overall, brands need to be willing to experiment with new approaches and reinvent their user experiences to successfully build relationships with their users.
