Unraveling the Recipe Behind the World’s Most Visited Furniture Website
Hi, pals!
New York has officially entered the Fall season. It’s getting cold outside, and I am joining the “stay-home snuggles on a couch” club. Typically, this is also the time of the year I would see how to make my home experience more lovely. With the ideas flowing, one thing I kept in mind on this rainy day, is just to shop it online. Aren’t you too?
The U.S. e-commerce sales contribute to 22.7% of the overall retail market. It should be a no-brainer for any company today to optimize their customer’s online shopping behavior through a great user experience (UX).
According to Statista, among the top 15 online shopping sites is IKEA — the giant Swedish furniture company. As an IKEA shopper, I feel that they are not only successful in creating a unique in-store exposure but also a pleasant website experience that makes me always want to come back.
Let’s dig into it!
- Seamless Journey
Straight to your appetite.
IKEA has a wide range of customers. In many cases, this caused a lot of brands to be a “hit or missed” when it comes to giving an enjoyable online experience. Imagine, you have a guest coming to your house. You want to make them feel they are in the right place the moment you open the door.
Most of the time, we find a website that displays bunches of amazing visuals but asks us to click the drop-down bar first, just to find the category we need.
In the case of IKEA, not even a second click or scroll, they directly show product categories on the top of the home page. It reduces shopper’s anxiety about seeing scattered and unrelatable information. Study shows that Choice Overload makes people end up not buying.
Intuitively, not all at once.
If the customers are the segment who came do not have something specific in mind yet, they would scroll through IKEA’s website and find different types of inspirations from trending themes, promotions, and favorite categories.
2. Empowering shoppers
Personal, but agile.
IKEA showcases diverse content that provokes the website visitors to be imaginative. Multiple visuals on how a product would fit into one’s personality at home are presented. Whether you are a cat person, a vintage lover, or a plant mom, this IKEA bookshelf is here to fit your character and is agile for different seasons of life. So, no worries if you happen to change your style in the future!
Accessibility: Can’t name it? No worries — just picture it.
Furniture shopping often comes as a long list. Sometimes, we just do not know the right keyword search for an item. So, it is highly convenient that IKEA added an image search engine. This feature is powered by AI, in which visitors are allowed to upload a picture of things they look for. The website then generates IKEA products that are related to the search.
3. Quick Response, makes you stay
How long is your tolerance level or loading time?
Speed is an unnegotiable element of an online experience. Based on Google Consumer Insights, 53% of mobile site visitors will exit a page if the loading time takes more than three seconds. This UX is crucial to ensure the customer has a pleasant journey from the start into conversion.
Not to mention, certain business categories will require a higher attention on this matter over others. For example, in furniture sites where people are likely to surf various content, ensuring customers have an optimized buying time.
Both on desktop and mobile, IKEA did a great job in maintaining consistent loading speed. This saves me time to explore more, and probably… nudges me more on things I need to check out!
To sum up…
Various studies have found the significance of User Experience in driving online brand engagement, conversion, and loyalty. Based on statistics reported by Mike Gualtieri, enhanced UX design can drive purchases by up to 400%.
I think IKEA sets a profound example of a customer-centric brand site and generates a positive experience. I believe that the three things I reviewed above are the recipe behind IKEA’s success as the most-visited furniture online store in the world.
I hope this writing inspires you to relook at your brand website and becomes a means for improvement.
Until the next blog!
Stay warm.
