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Year
Year
2022
2022
Client
Client
IKEA
IKEA
Type
Type
Research & MP Design
Research & MP Design
Optimizing Digital Touchpoints for a Next-Generation Shopping Experience
Optimizing Digital Touchpoints for a Next-Generation Shopping Experience
In mid-2021, IKEA unveiled a groundbreaking concept store in Shanghai—the "Home Experience of Tomorrow." Departing from the traditional winding store layout leading to a self-pickup area, this innovative space reimagines the shopping journey as a community-centric, immersive experience. At its core, the store leverages digital touchpoints to revolutionize the way customers shop, enabling them to browse, purchase, and check out entirely through their smartphones.
However, with such a dramatic shift from the familiar IKEA experience, the challenge lay in effectively educating customers about these new concepts while ensuring the experience remained seamless, intuitive, and enjoyable.
In mid-2021, IKEA unveiled a groundbreaking concept store in Shanghai—the "Home Experience of Tomorrow." Departing from the traditional winding store layout leading to a self-pickup area, this innovative space reimagines the shopping journey as a community-centric, immersive experience. At its core, the store leverages digital touchpoints to revolutionize the way customers shop, enabling them to browse, purchase, and check out entirely through their smartphones.
However, with such a dramatic shift from the familiar IKEA experience, the challenge lay in effectively educating customers about these new concepts while ensuring the experience remained seamless, intuitive, and enjoyable.
Collaborative Design with Customers in Generative Workshops
Collaborative Design with Customers in Generative Workshops
To craft ideal experiences for future users, we began by segmenting a diverse range of IKEA's target customer groups for generative design workshops. Prior to participating, each attendee completed mystery shopping tasks at the "Home Experience of Tomorrow" store. During these tasks, they interacted with the digital touchpoints central to our study, meticulously documenting their experiences through photos, videos, and written journals. This foundational step ensured that every participant brought firsthand insights into the workshops, enabling a deeper understanding of user needs and behaviors.
To craft ideal experiences for future users, we began by segmenting a diverse range of IKEA's target customer groups for generative design workshops. Prior to participating, each attendee completed mystery shopping tasks at the "Home Experience of Tomorrow" store. During these tasks, they interacted with the digital touchpoints central to our study, meticulously documenting their experiences through photos, videos, and written journals. This foundational step ensured that every participant brought firsthand insights into the workshops, enabling a deeper understanding of user needs and behaviors.
Iterative design sprints
Iterative design sprints
The output of the generative design workshops formed the foundation and direction for the design opportunities of the digital touchpoints in Ikea Shanghai's Home Experience of Tomorrow.
In-store navigation
Scan & go (mobile checkout)
Locker pickup
Food ordering
Instore community events
After synthesizing the insights; we ran a series of design sprints to generate concepts for the key touchpoints. These concepts were brought to life through high-fidelity, interactive prototypes tested in-store with target users. Between each of the four rounds of testing, we made iterative improvements to the designs based on customer feedback to continue to optimize the design, communication, value, and user experience.
The output of the generative design workshops formed the foundation and direction for the design opportunities of the digital touchpoints in Ikea Shanghai's Home Experience of Tomorrow.
In-store navigation
Scan & go (mobile checkout)
Locker pickup
Food ordering
Instore community events
After synthesizing the insights; we ran a series of design sprints to generate concepts for the key touchpoints. These concepts were brought to life through high-fidelity, interactive prototypes tested in-store with target users. Between each of the four rounds of testing, we made iterative improvements to the designs based on customer feedback to continue to optimize the design, communication, value, and user experience.
