Case: BilligVVS

Shoppable image universe increases conversion

With Hesehus as partner, BilligVVS has developed a new inspiration universe

With Hesehus as a partner in the design and concept development, BilligVVS, the Scandinavian market leader in online sales of plumbing and heating products, has created a unique inspiration universe. The goal was to create a less technical approach to the world of plumbing and heating, reach new audiences and meet the needs of the female customer segment. Just a year after going live, 65% of all visitors to BilligVVS’ inspiration universe are new users who have not interacted with BilligVVS before. By arranging BilligVVS' many images of decor models in a completely new way and integrating features known from the fashion industry and social media such as Pinterest into the design, the inspiration universe makes it easy and quick to move from inspiration to check-out.

Ease of use, sublime service and focus on customer needs have been a high priority at BilligVVS since the beginning in 2000. Therefore, they were also some of the most important elements for BilligVVS when they came to Hesehus with the desire to design the new inspiration universe.

Katrine Bækgaard Stotz, Content Marketing Specialist at BilligVVS

"A key element of our business strategy is ease of use, and therefore it is also crucial for us to offer our customers relevant content no matter where they are in the shopping process. The new inspiration universe allows us to help our customers even more already in the inspiration phase. And we can see this directly on the bottom line, where the conversion rate has increased by 19% and the basket size by 17% for customers who have visited the inspiration universe"

BilligVVS' inspiration universe makes it easy to go from inspiration to purchase

Shoppable: Go from inspiration to purchase

The inspiration universe gives BilligVVS’ customers the opportunity to surf around among a sea of beautiful images showing decor models and seek inspiration for their upcoming DIY project – whether it be in the bathroom, utility room, garden, kitchen, bedroom or living room.

One of the unique and key features is that the inspiration universe is shoppable and thus designed to integrate directly to the webshop. Through the clickable hotspots in the images, customers can open a preview of each product from which they can quickly get an overview of product details and price, go to the product page or put the product directly into their shopping cart.

In other words, the hotspots make it possible to move seamlessly from inspiration to purchase, and they make it possible to combine the interior and design aspects of the shopping process with information on the more technical aspects and features of the products.

Explore BilligVVS’ unique inspiration universe

Flexible product search via photo tags

Another area, where BilligVVS proves itself as one of the front runners in both the heating and plumbing industry as well as within the field of e-commerce in general, is in the use of tags in the inspiration universe. The inspiration universe combines the classic filtering options that you know from most webshops today with photo tags known from Pinterest and Instagram, among others.

Through the classic filters, customers can set a direction for what they are looking for, such as a Nordic style kitchen. With the clickable photo tags, customers can choose to “take a shortcut”, dive into other themes and discover new possibilities along the way. In this way, BiligVVS’ inspiration universe raises the bar for flexible product search. As a result, the average visit duration has increased by 157% for visits where the inspiration universe is part of the user journey, and the average number of viewed pages per visit has increased by 168% compared with visits to the webshop alone.

Concret advise, tips and tricks with inspirational articles

In the design of the inspiration universe, focus has also been on combining the new, primarily visual universe with the more classic, written inspiration. Therefore, when customers explore the many images, they find inspirational articles attached to some of the images. Here, for example, they can read more about minimalist design or find advice on how to bring a little extra luxury into their home.

With the integration of inspirational articles, BilligVVS can thus guide their customers with specific tips and tricks, which helps to keep visitors on the site a bit longer. In addition, the articles also give BilligVVS the opportunity to work even more strategically with SEO, and as a result, the inspiration universe has created traffic to the site via organic visibility in more than 130 new keywords since going live.

Case details

Design of new inspiration universe in May 2019 and launch in the fall of 2019

The inspiration universe is the second stage of the collaboration, which started in 2016 with the development of a new website design for BilligVVS and its sister company LavprisVVS, which are both part of Brødrene A. & O Johansen, Denmark's leading wholesaler of building goods.