Case Study: IKEA
UX Research and Service Design
2 Week Sprint
Synopsis
IKEA is a multinational retailer founded by Ingvar Kamprad in 1943 which designs and sells ready for assemble home appliances and furniture. IKEA stores, website and catalogues provide customers with design inspirations for their home and office. The IKEA in-store and post-purchase interaction with their products is centred around the D.I.Y. concept. Additional customer support services such as delivery, assembly and installation are available at a price.
As a team our task was to develop an online experience that provides IKEA customers with the same appearance and impression as their in-store experience. The goal is to for this e-commerce branch of their business to account for 10% of their revenue by 2020.
Project Journey
With the brief in hand, we shifted our attention to the project strategy. We had a two week period to develop a solution, so we decided that the best course of action was to divide our project into individual phases. Accordingly, we utilised the Double Diamond process which formed our overall strategic approach for our project.
We decided the best way to tackle our tasks was by being lean and agile, with the goal to fail fast and learn fast. The presentation of this brief may seem as though everything happened in chronological order, but that couldn’t be further from the truth.
A realistic presentation of our work process is shown below:
Research
As we began working on this project, we found ourselves with more questions than answers. We asked ourselves: how were we going to get customers to use the IKEA e-commerce store? Which customer groups will use the e-commerce store, and why? Also, is developing an e-commerce store the best solution for our client?
With these questions in mind, we developed a hunt statement to assist our journey into the Discovery phase of the Double Diamond:
Our hunt statement aims to understand the underlying factors impacting customer purchasing decisions and potentially how a digital solution may impact their behaviour.
With this in mind, I took the task of looking at what other retailers were doing in this space. Our comparative analysis consists of both direct and indirect competitors.
Comparative Analysis
Bunnings Warehouse
Bunnings Warehouse is a household hardware chain. The Bunnings website is an online catalogue where customers can browse store and product details but must visit a store to complete their transaction. Bunnings mitigates some of the inconveniences of in-store shopping through a convenient and affordable delivery service. Customers have the option to self-pickup, rent a trailer or van from Bunnings or have it delivered. IKEA may be able to incorporate more flexible and affordable delivery choices for their future in-store and online customers.
Temple & Webster
Temple & Webster is an online retailer of furniture and home-wares. In addition to having a large range of affordable products, Temple & Webster also has fast and affordable delivery. Research has shown that the company is interested in establishing brick and mortar stores to capture a greater percentage of the home-wares and furniture market. Their recent business struggles could offer IKEA some key insights on how they can develop an e-commerce website that complements their brick and mortar stores.
Kmart
Kmart is a discount department store with a wide range of everyday home products at affordable prices. Kmart offers customers the choice of online purchases via their online store with the option of affordable and fast delivery or click and collect at a local Kmart store.
User Interviews
With the competitor analysis on the way, I joined the rest of the team for a day in IKEA Richmond where we observed how customers interacted in-store and conducted user interviews. By the end of the day, we had successfully interviewed 40 customers in IKEA.
Naturally we were all excited to dive into our user interviews and compile our interview findings into an affinity map:
From the affinity mapping process, we generated valuable insights that helped us to develop three distinct customer groups: The Airbnb Host, The Starter & The Regional Shopper, as shown below:
Building upon the three customers groups, we then developed archetypes. Our team took the challenge of building an archetype for the The Airbnb Host as shown below.
We chose this particular archetype because our research showed that Tennyus that IKEA currently offers end-to-end services to business customers but has yet to extend such services to individuals. We believe that we can develop a solution for Tennyson by utilising existing IKEA networks, systems, people and knowledge.
Meet Tennyson Seeto!
With our persona completed, it became clear to us that a simple e-commerce store would not deliver the desired outcomes for Tennyson Seeto. What Tennyson needed was a service, but what kind of service? How will it be delivered? Who will be involved? Once again we found ourselves in the familiar territory of having more questions than answers.
Path Finding
What we needed was direction and my intuition told me that we could utilise IKEA’s existing skills and resources to deliver this solution. We know that IKEA has the skills and resources for design, delivery, assembly and installation. So how can we develop a solution for Tennyson that not only delivers him an end-to-end service but also aligns with IKEA’s existing strengths?
Answer: Back to the drawing board!
After much discussion, A LOT of coffee, sugar and ideation we finally reached our solution!
This service is delivered through a web app which allows customers to:
- Interact with their personal concierge using their preferred channel of communication
- Receive customised design for their property
- Track progress
- Watch the assembly and installation process via a live feed
Flow and Wireframes
With our solution in mind, I was able to develop our user flows. For comparison purposes I developed a current state and future state user flow for Tennyson.
IKEA: Current State
IKEA: Future State
Wireframing
From the future state user flow, we developed the first version of wireframes:
Prototype
Building upon our initial wireframes, we developed our first paper prototype of IKEA Concierge:
User Testing
Excited with finally having something we could test, we arranged an appointment with our first user. At the onset of the test, we informed our user that this was functional test, not the final look of the product. What we wanted to conduct was a usability test as this was still the very early stages of our prototyping.
From the paper prototype testing we found that:
Trust in the quality of service and products was key. The user required a trusted person of their choice to give them the confirmation that the service was delivered to their expectations.
- Users preferred updates on progress via push notifications or the web app over emails.
- A need for greater transparency, especially at the assembly and installation stage. User may require a trusted third party to confirm the final stage of delivery.
Moving Forward
With the limited time frame of 2 weeks to work on this project there where a few areas that I would personally like to explore further and refine:
- Extensive user testing
- Create a hi-fidelity digital prototype
- Develop content strategy for IKEA Concierge
- Develop a branding strategy that would resonate with our target persona
