As the leading household appliances brand in Turkey, Arçelik continues to strengthen its innovative brand image. Through using the cloud-based augmented reality imaging service powered by Holonext, Arçelik has enabled their customers to view dozens of popular products in AR at their homes and have a unique shopping experience.

About Arçelik

Alongside eleven other brands, Arçelik belongs to Arçelik A.Ş. –which is a Turkish multinational household appliances manufacturer. With sales and marketing offices in 48 countries, and 28 production facilities in 9 countries, Arçelik offers products and services to many different regions of the world. In Turkey, Arçelik is the only brand that has been selected as the Lovemark for the last 12 years in addition to being the most preferred brand by the consumers. 

Being the most preferred brand by the consumers in its industry; it is important for Arçelik to be at the forefront of technological developments in all areas, including retail and marketing. To this end, the brand has always been looking for new ways to enrich online shopping experience, increase online conversion rates and page durations with the increasing e-commerce habits of consumers. 

In order to provide its customers with a better and more immersive shopping experience, Arçelik decided to incorporate Holonext’s AR technology into its website at the end of 2020.

 

Advancing the Online Shopping Experience

One of the major problems customers are having with online shopping today is the absence of physical sampling. For a household appliances brand like Arçelik, this means that the customers have a hard time visualizing exactly how the products they want to buy would look in their spaces. This issue became even more prevalent when the pandemic started and visiting Arçelik stores in person was no longer possible. 

After observing this problem, Arçelik decided to integrate AR technology into its online store. At first, 3D models were designed after Arçelik products. Later, the models were combined with Holonext’s cloud-based AR imaging service –which can be fully integrated into websites. Finally, a ‘View the Product at Home with Augmented Reality’ button was added to the product pages under arcelik.com.tr. For the first phase, 100 Arçelik products were turned into 3D models for the AR mode view. 

When the system went live in September 2020, Arçelik announced the project from its social media accounts and website. The communication campaign for the AR feature lasted a month and it included a one-minute long video and social media posts. The main video and social media posts explain to customers how they can benefit from this new technology that makes online purchasing easy, fun and practical. In addition to emphasizing Arçelik’s innovative image and boosting its online sales, the campaign also aimed at reaching the younger generations that are more familiar with the newer technologies like AR and 3D.

A First in the Industry

The AR feature is fully integrated to the Arçelik website and doesn’t require customers to download any additional application. For the first time in the household appliances industry in Turkey; Arçelik, along with Holonext, has carried out a project to display products with web-based AR technology. 

Now, customers have the opportunity to experience Arçelik products with exact dimensions and real colors without having to visit the stores. The shopping process as a whole has been elevated. The experience customers have on the online Arçelik store is much more enjoyable, simple, and practical. 

273% Higher Conversion Rate with the AR Feature

After the integration of the AR function into Arçelik website conversion rates increased up to %313 and also the time spent in the web site more than 7x times which resulted in high customer engagement. Site users viewed products with AR technology 124 thousand times and spent an average of 9 minutes. When all users and AR button conversion rates were compared, a higher rate was obtained from the AR button segment with a difference of 273%.   Users who clicked on the AR Button had 291% more engagement. This shows that the AR mode was far more successful in creating an interaction between customers and products. Eventually, the best-selling products were No Frost Refrigerator and Dryer. 

The communications campaign was also a success. According to the YouTube Brandlift results, the ad recall lift rate was 32.85%, surpassing benchmarks. The AR feature received positive feedback on other forms of social media as well.