IKEA is known worldwide for their famous ‘flat-pack’ furniture. The 21st Century is changing the way in which people shop and with the help of social media, IKEA is able to utilise cookies to help them understand what their customers want to be looking at. This can be shown across many different social media platforms. Cookies are designed to catch your eye when you are browsing sites such as Facebook or Instagram, Ikea even went as far as designing a campaign based on them:
“Where Life Happens”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9SFeRNAfEA
Brandwatch
IKEA’s online marketing is set out to listen to what the customer wants and search for the products that they might not of seen before. Brandwatch is one of the worlds leading social media listening and analytics technology platforms. By having this platform, IKEA are able to understand what the business needs to do to enable them to make proactive decisions for the future. By having a media platform such as Brandwatch, IKEA are able to set a clear target market for certain products which can then be linked into peoples everyday feeds, whether that be on social media, by e-mail or by post.
Brandwatch does work with other companies, however IKEA has a global manufacturing, distribution and retail marketing system that makes the company a formidable market focus with no competition. Another system that IKEA has unique to them is the ‘listening hub’.This platform was created so that the marketing team can present a real space for sharing new ideas within the organisation, both in Europe and America.
Facebook:
- Attracts almost 200,000 fans
- The social media team post questions, links to photo albums and posts youtube clips
- engagement is excellent on this platform- each post gets a few hundred likes
- Customers have a voice: e.g ‘The Ikea Big Sleepover’ Thousands of customers came up with the idea of a sleepover at Ikea, make a group via Facebook which lead to 100 lucky customers getting to spend the night in an Ikea warehouse in Essex.
Twitter:
- responds quickly to @ mentions
- Used widely to respond to complains or queries from customers
Utilised more in the US – the UK tried the platform but didn’t get a positive response
- Around 3,000 followers in the UK
- John Lewis- one of Ikea’s main competitors uses this platform, however Ikea believes that the platform doesn’t promote Ikea in the manner they want to promote it in
- Still a new venture for Ikea- other social media thrive better so more time and money are spent on them
- Pinterest does offer companies to express themselves, focusing on their personalitY and values- something that Ikea might be missing out on
Ikea is moving forward by working with the popular social media platforms.By adapting their brand to individual customers needs, they are able to branch out to a wider audience which means they can advertise and sell to many different generations. They are creating a platform that can be understood by all, which from a business perspective can only lead to positive results.
References:
Brandwatch., (2014). ‘Case Study/ Ikea and the Socializers’ [Online] Available at: https://static1.squarespace.com/static/587bf6fc4402438507f325b1/t/595ec388099c012b130166e0/1499382665801/IKEA_CaseStudy.pdf (accessed 01/10/2018)
Moth, D., (2013). ‘How Ikea uses Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter and Google+’ [Online] Available at: https://econsultancy.com/how-ikea-uses-pinterest-facebook-twitter-and-google/(accessed 01/10/2018)