Rest is best: How IKEA harnessed the appeal of a good night’s sleep to drive customers to store

Thursday, August 8, 2019 - 13:38

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when it comes to digital, advertisers have long aimed to reach audiences with a relevant message at exactly the right moment. However, few advertisers have taken this phrase as literally as IKEA Canada, with their Complete Sleep campaign.

IKEA Canada recently partnered with YouTube and agencies Jungle Media and Rethink to create their first digital-led video campaign, “Complete Sleep.” Together, they created a personalized video campaign rooted in deep consumer insights to influence sleep-deprived Canadians to visit IKEA stores to buy new bedroom products.

Instead of simply putting TV assets on YouTube, the brand decided to take a different approach to promoting mattresses: leveraging custom YouTube video creative to influence online and offline shopping behaviour.

IKEA’s customized YouTube campaign drove outstanding results

Finding a purpose-driven message that resonates

With a strategic focus on the bedroom, IKEA wanted to use online video in an innovative way to highlight the mattress as a key protagonist of the complete sleep offer.

They learned that one third of Canadians do not sleep the 7-hours per night that they should, and are often exhausted. IKEA decided to use this insight as inspiration for a campaign message around sleep that anchored the creative and resonated with many — but still left room for customization.

Taking a customized creative approach

The campaign creative consisted of a 15-second spot that ran on YouTube late at night, between 10:45 p.m. and 3:30 a.m., encouraging viewers to stop watching and get some rest. But to both bolster and personalize their core message, IKEA made over 20 different versions of the ad using YouTube’s Director Mix tool.

Director’s Mix allows advertisers to create videos featuring highly targeted messages at scale, providing cost efficiencies back to creative agencies and clients. IKEA used the tool to connect with their customers at a precise moment in time by altering messaging based on time-of-day signals. Each version of IKEA’s customized spots featured a superimposed clock with the viewer’s precise time, a countdown to when their nearest IKEA store would open, and a call-to-action to visit their mattress event.

Overall, IKEA converted over 50,000 viewers from online viewing to offline shopping at a cost per store visit of under $1.20 in the first 8 weeks of the campaign. They saw a 22% lift in ad recall from this campaign, a 108% lift in Search interest for the IKEA brand, and a 673% increase in searches for IKEA Bedroom products. IKEA’s Head of Digital Marketing, Santiago Arbelaez, says, “The great results from this campaign highlight the impact we can create with online video. Director’s Mix is a tool that we will definitely use again in the future.” IKEA intends to continue to rely on compelling creative to win over their customers and bridge the gap between the offline and online world.

Here are three takeaways to help you bring your own digital-first campaign to life:	A universal message helps digital marketing find its audience: By launching a campaign around something all Canadians need more of — sleep — IKEA’s messaging reached far and wide.
	Personalization of digital ads provides a more dynamic interaction than television: Custom creative and targeted advertising allowed IKEA to send the right message to the right person at the right time.
	With automated creative development, marketers can save money and make a greater impact with digital-first campaigns: Director Mix allowed IKEA to create a highly customized campaign for only $1.20 per store visit.