For more information about the project, please visit our website.
Our innovation is desirable because it enables the IKEA employees to be more efficient while assisting customers. By enabling them to directly gather information from their phone instead of forcing them to go to the physical information desk, we improve the experience on both the employee- and customer-end. The customisability of the app also ensures that each employee can adapt it to their particular use case. Ultimately, our solution increases the chance of the customer walking away with a better experience and makes it more likely that they will come back again.
Our solution improves the customer experience by enabling employees to assist customers more efficiently. This results in the customer leaving the stores more satisfied and with a better perception of IKEA. In turn, this will lead to the customer being more likely to return for another visit and potentially, even recommend IKEA to friends. In the long term, this will drive up sales and profit, which will more than offset the development cost of the solution.
Our solution is feasible because it mostly utilises the information from existing systems to find a better solution to the same problem they attempt to solve. There is no need to start from zero with no direction, and developers will have the previous systems as assistance when developing the new tool. The technical part of the solution is also quite feasible, as we have chosen to use Android Studio with Kotlin and Jetpack Compose, the industry standard when developing Android applications.
We seek to collaborate with IKEA on developing our application. In alignment with IKEA’s key values, our aim is to rethink and improve knowledge transfer systems while prioritising simplicity and sustainability.
Specifically, we would like to further investigate what kind of information IKEA employees need to look up in the current systems. To accomplish this, we will use a two-pronged approach. Firstly, we will analyse the pages IKEA salespersons frequently visit to know exactly what to prioritise. Secondly, we’ll survey IKEA customers about this to get their perspective on what should be included in the app.
Furthermore, we will need IKEA’s support in tracking and compiling relevant product sustainability information displayed in our app as well as adapting our app to the currently used Honeywell devices.
After sufficient user testing, we plan to roll out the app to employees in IKEA Kållered and Bäckebol, continually gathering feedback for improvements. With more data, we can also evaluate and adapt the app for a prospective customer rollout.