In the furniture sector, the quality of your furniture and the refinement of your design are not enough to be successful.
Attention: this does not mean that the search for beauty in environments, furnishings and materials is useless. On the contrary, all of this remains the soul of the entire furniture industry. But without a strategy aimed at your business objectives, the quality of your offer risks not being valued. And, even worse, to go unnoticed.
A valid approach to marketing in this scenario? The inbound .
Would you like to know more? Keep reading!
In this article we talk about:
- Buying behavior in the furniture & design market
- Customers choose not based on quality, but based on perceived value
- Purchase decisions in furniture: a matter of trust
- The Inbound Marketing strategy
- Why does inbound apply perfectly to the furniture sector?
- The Inbound philosophy
- The funnel: the 4 phases of inbound marketing
- Attract / Phase 1
- Convert / Phase 2
- Closing / Phase 3
- Delight / Phase 4
- Sales & marketing automation & HubSpot: further advantages of inbound
Buying behavior in the furniture & design market
Perceived value and trust. These are the keywords that best describe the evolution of the behavior of the players in the furniture sector. Let’s see in detail what it is
Customers choose not based on quality, but based on perceived value
Consumers today don’t choose based on the quality of your products. Often they don’t even know them. Indeed, very often they do not know them.
Think about it, when your customers choose which kitchen table to buy, do they get detailed information on the characteristics of the wood? How were the various strips worked and cut? How are the different pieces assembled? In most cases, no.
Customers choose a particular table for the color of the wood, for its grain, for how they imagine it in their kitchen, or for the story that the piece of furniture tells. Or because of the way you introduce and present it.
Basically, customers choose what to buy based on perceived value , that is, according to their subjective view of the offer. Perceived quality beats objective quality.
How to improve the perceived value of your furniture, your showroom or your brand? With marketing and communication ! And above all with a strategy !
Purchase decisions in furniture: a matter of trust
Another central dynamic in the Furniture & Design sector is trust .
Most buyers see furniture as an important commitment. This applies to both B2C and B2B buyers.
In B2C , end consumers want to choose their furniture carefully. The furniture will in fact become part of their home, their life and even their identity, from the moment in which the home is an important part of one’s person.
In the B2B scenario , architects, designers and retailers are looking for trusted furniture manufacturers to collaborate with and enter into commercial agreements. After all, today the offer is really wide, there are many manufacturing companies, and each of them can be found online in a few simple clicks.
The skill that can change the cards for a company is the ability to build professional relationships. And above all to generate trust . This is true in both B2C and B2B.
How to build trust? With a good marketing strategy !
The Inbound Marketing strategy
In summary, in the Furniture & Design market two components are fundamental: perceived quality and trust.
These components are easily accessible thanks to an inbound strategy .
Inbound Marketing is based on attracting new customers and retaining existing ones. All through the creation of valuable content and tailor-made experiences. The inbound approach aims to build valuable relationships with its audience, adopting a communication built specifically for its target.
In this logic, the contents proposed to your target audience will be punctual, engaging and as personalized as possible. But above all, they will be able to respond to specific needs and requirements, tastes and desires.
Why does inbound apply perfectly to the furniture sector?
If you share valuable content, you will position yourself as an industry benchmark . You will earn the trust of your users. As a direct consequence, your buyers will think directly about your brand when they are ready to make a purchase decision (or collaboration in the case of B2B).
Plus, the consumers you attract to your brand will see you with different eyes. They will perceive a higher value in your offer.
The Inbound philosophy
The idea of inbound is to attract the best prospects by setting up a communication of interest to them. And above all without giving the feeling of being intrusive or insistent. Who does inbound aims to help users and stimulate them with interesting content.
The aim is to be found at the right time in the right place, without interrupting their navigation path. It is a strategy capable of attracting qualified targets who, once hit, will always come back to you. This is a fundamental component in the furniture sector!
The funnel: the 4 phases of inbound marketing
Inbound Marketing is based on four main phases. These reflect the buyer journey , that is the user’s purchase path.
The different phases are often represented by the funnel , that is, by a funnel. In the initial part (upper section of the funnel) the audience is very large, while continuing in the process (going down into the funnel) the audience narrows. At the end of the path, only the users who have decided to buy remain (lower section of the funnel).
Here are the 4 stages of the funnel:
Attract / Phase 1
In the first phase, the goal is to attract new visitors to your platforms (website or social page).
How to attract new users? First you will need to get to know them . You need to know what they are looking for in a piece of furniture, what information they are looking for online, what their doubts are and what answers they need. In this way it will be possible to build ad hoc content. To help you, you can build buyer personas , or identikits of your buyers. This will be really useful to you.
By offering quality content, such as blog articles , and promoting them online, you can intercept new users.
Convert / Phase 2
At this stage, the goal is to convert your site visitors into leads .
You can overcome this challenge by providing really interesting content and placing CTAs (call-to-action) on your site. These are “calls to action”. For example, the buttons “contact us now” or “subscribe now” that you have certainly seen online thousands of times.
Thanks to the CTAs you can push users to leave their data voluntarily and spontaneously. You will then be able to contact them again, continuing to provide them with valuable content, such as email updates on the latest interior design trends, or on your new furniture. The purpose? Cultivate relationships (and trust) with users, laying the foundations to convert them into customers.
Closing / Phase 3
This is the closing phase : it consists of transforming contacts into customers.
Starting from the database that we have acquired thanks to the previous phases, and with the help of email marketing campaigns , you will be able to guide your contacts to purchase. Thanks to the automation of campaigns, managed by specific workflows , you will be able to “nourish your contacts with valuable content, transforming them into customers.
Delight / Phase 1
Found new customers? Good! But the marketing efforts don’t end there. The last step is based on the seduction of its customers. The target? Delight them .
By developing bonds of trust, customers will turn into true followers of your brand, into evangelists . It means that they will talk about you with enthusiasm and positivity, attracting other people to you. Don’t forget that word -of-mouth remains one of the most powerful channels in marketing.
Again, the contents are decisive. It is precisely the interesting, engaging and useful communications that keep users loyal to your brand.
Sales & marketing automation & HubSpot: further advantages of inbound
Inbound marketing is based on sharing personalized content and communications, aimed at the right people .
In this regard, sales & marketing automation plays a fundamental role. Not surprisingly, inbound and automation always go hand in hand. Just think that the inbound methodology was introduced way back in 2006 by HubSpot , the world’s leading marketing, sales and automation software.
The automation of the activities brings numerous advantages in the business field:
- automation of sales & marketing activities
- management of forms on websites
- CRM, contact and database management
- automation of email campaigns
- creation of sales pipelines
- resource optimization
- collection of valuable data and information to optimize the strategy
Conclusion
Basically, the keywords that best summarize the inbound approach are: perceived value, trust, content, customer conversion and business enhancement.
All this applies perfectly to the Furniture & Design sector . Both B2C and B2B.
The future is inbound.
