OUGD401
Practical Exploration

"IKEA boosts the number of social media followers by engaging their audience with...print"

IKEA has already established its position as the 'go to' ready-to-assemble furniture retailer, strongly aided by their annual IKEA catalogue- the main marketing tool for the brand, with 70% of the annual budget dedicated to producing it. To push social media activity using the catalogue release as a starter, IKEA implemented a completely cost free solution to get their online followers buzzing. In Norway, every household receives an IKEA catalog, so brand decided to integrate their existing marketing channel in a new way. The idea was to get people talking about the new product range and spread the content online: IKEA encouraged its social media followers on Facebook and Instagram to snap pictures of furniture items on the pages of the catalogue, and post them under the hashtag #ikeakatalogen along with the item's name. As an added incentive, every week, IKEA would give away an item to one of the users who uploaded the image online. Within just four weeks, the campaign was able to successfully recreate IKEA's print catalog online, after every item in the catalog had been photographed and uploaded. IKEA Norway dramatically increased social media following and engagement, especially on Instagram, where it went from having 0 to 12,000 followers. The campaign execution cost IKEA a few products and 0% of their annual marketing activity budget.

This campaign shows that printed media working alongside digital formats such Instagram and Facebook engages the user more. This could be similar to the QR codes used in my newsletter, the mix of print and digital working together as a marketing tool.