{"id":8288,"date":"2020-05-06T06:00:32","date_gmt":"2020-05-06T13:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/power-platform\/blog\/power-apps\/ikea-sweden\/"},"modified":"2024-09-25T13:33:48","modified_gmt":"2024-09-25T20:33:48","slug":"ikea-sweden","status":"publish","type":"power-apps","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/power-platform\/blog\/power-apps\/ikea-sweden\/","title":{"rendered":"IKEA Sweden \u2013 Reimagining the customer experience with Microsoft Power Platform"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

IKEA is a Swedish company that was established in 1943. The company designs and sells ready-to-assemble furniture, kitchen appliances and home products, among other goods and home services. Across the globe, IKEA has 211,000 employees, 433 stores, and operates in 50 e-commerce markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In this post we look at how IKEA Sweden<\/a> partnered with Capgemini<\/a>, a Microsoft Gold Partner, to build a Dynamics 365 and Power Platform solution for its sales staff to improve the kitchen buying experience for individual customers (B2C) and businesses (B2B). They wanted to provide their customers with a sense that \u201cIKEA sees me\u201d when working through the process of building a new kitchen. This project contributes to realizing the vision of having a holistic single view of the customer over the lifetime of their relationship with IKEA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cMicrosoft Dynamics 365 and Power Platform ensures that our customers feel seen. It makes it smoother for our co-workers to take the customer through the kitchen buying process. It has been an enabler to build long term business relationships based on quality and trust.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

-Michel Tabakovic, IKEA Country Sales Manager<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Meet Miki<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

As the Country Sales Manager, Michel Tabakovic (Miki) leads the sales teams across IKEA Sweden. IKEA is evolving its business from being primarily perceived as a do-it-yourself furniture store to providing complete home solutions, such as large-scale kitchen remodel projects. Miki\u2019s vision for technology is to \u201cprovide a single source for the customer view and enable IKEA to be a part of the customer\u2019s long-term journey \u2013 for end customers and businesses.\u201d He sees digital transformation being a key to improving the \u201chuman to human connection\u201d \u2013 equipping the sales teams with customer stories and data points that will help them serve customers today and for years to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"IKEA<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Miki\u2019s motivation and drive to adopt Dynamics 365 and the Power Platform started when the IKEA Board and CEO asked questions about kitchen sales, such as \u2013 sales conversation rates, why were customers not buying kitchens with IKEA, who were the existing B2B customers, what was the potential size of the B2B market, and more. The team did not have answers to these questions because the data was not captured in a structured manner. Miki decided to take the lead from within the business to find a technology solution for these challenges. Initially, he did not receive much support from Corporate IT, but he continued to push on convincing multiple stakeholders and getting the necessary funding for the project. In his words \u2013 \u201cI refused to take no for an answer but I was humble at the same time, understanding that the process was complex and the project needed to be scalable globally.\u201d<\/i><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, with the IKEA Sales Tool, Miki believes that IKEA kitchen and B2B sales teams will be able to make data driven decisions that benefit the customer through the entirety of the kitchen buying process. The data will enable capturing trends early before they become mainstream. For example \u2013 kitchen islands were an emerging trend before they became mainstream, customers have now started buying two ovens, what is the next trend? The system will allow the sales teams to learn and act on these quickly during the sales cycle. He considers this as just the beginning, the foundation of being part of the customer journey for many years to come. He continues to stress that the tool is ultimately for his sales team in the field to form stronger human connections with their customers.<\/p>\n\n\n

\"text,<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Business challenge<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The kitchen is the place where family and friends gather to cook, socialize, and eat together. Many might say it is the most important room in one\u2019s home, as it is the center of the family\u2019s day-to-day life. Considering its importance, it is natural to go about an organized approach, pay attention to details, and spend the necessary time when planning a new kitchen. While IKEA\u2019s intention was to take the customer through an exceptional journey from initial idea to a ready kitchen, the reality in each local store was quite different.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The kitchen departments lacked a structured process for documenting and managing sales. IKEA heard from customers that the main reason they did not purchase kitchens at IKEA was because they felt the company did not provide good support through the buying process. Meanwhile the high demand for kitchen sales continued to grow in the market, with a growing awareness of the increased competition and greater customer expectations for the buying journey and final product. For all these reasons, IKEA needed to transition the way they sold kitchens for B2C and B2B customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before Power Platform<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Before the Dynamics 365 and Power Platform solution, the kitchen department used a homegrown spreadsheet-based solution to keep track of kitchen planning appointments, prospective customers, ongoing projects and the various elements that define the kitchen-buying journey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Similarly, the B2B sales team also used Excel spreadsheets to track individual and aggregated kitchen sales. The homegrown \u201clow tech\u201d solutions created by individual sellers lacked a structured or unified approach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Besides B2C and B2B sales, the Customer Support Center (CSC) process of making appointments was also manual. If a customer called the CSC to make an appointment, the agent would put the customer on hold and call the local store to schedule a kitchen consultation. The local store would then look at an excel spreadsheet to see what was available. Once the meeting was booked the notification back to the customer was done manually.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This process resulted in several challenges, such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n