This thesis proposes a strategy in the form of a design roadmap in order to enhance the E-loyalty (brand loyalty) of the E-commerce company Home Design Shops.The past 10 years internet retail sales have been rapidly growing. The gradual shift from offline to online shopping comes with its own set of unique challenges for brands and business operations. Consumers are almost effortlessly able to compare different competitors that offer the same product or service. “The result is fierce price competition and vanishing brand loyalty.” Kuttner (1998). This is also a problem that Home Design Shops encounters as an e-commerce company in the living/home-goods sector. The company wants to distinguish itself from colossal competitors like FonQ, Bol.com and Amazon by offering the best service and service support during the complete customer journey when renovating a house. The past years Home Design Shops has showed remarkably growth with revenue growth numbers up to 50% per year. To maintain this sustainable growth while at the same time distinguishing themselves from their competitors, there was the need for a new long-lasting strategy. Therefore, the goal of this graduation project was to develop a strategy that would result in an increase in brand loyalty combined with growth on the long run. The foundation of the strategy has been developed by performing an extensive internal analysis of the company and an external analysis consisting of a consumer, competitor market and trend analysis. The result was summarized into a future vision which describes the desired effect that needs to be achieved with the future strategy:
Empowering customers to become proud and delighted home-owners. By supporting them along every stage of their journey and exceeding all their needs. Giving them confidence and confirmation by offering personalized help, advice, products and services. In order to realize this strategy three overlapping continuous cycles (Horizons) of strategic business innovation has been constructed: Delighting the customer. By providing them with all the support, content and product knowledge needed to confidentially make their own product choice and get the job done. Recommending customers. By becoming personal: getting to know their preferences and recommending a fitting interior or product combinations to them. Empowering customers. By helping them to achieve their project goals, providing an ecosystem with all the services, tools, content and products to confidentially plan and shape their own project. The strategy is presented in the form of a roadmap providing a chronological step-by-step approach in order to reach the future vision. Providing an overview of the: value propositions, features of the products/services, needed technology & data stream and the corresponding revenue models. Three design solutions have been conceptualized in order to make them tangible and validate hypotheses with in the form of a user test.