Sofology sitting pretty with AI search

Furniture retailer Sofology has achieved 7x ROI from foot traffic, increased customer footfall and conversions by using AI search technology

Sofology integrated Yext Listings and Reviews to increase organic search traffic and optimise listings to increase customer footfall and keep online visitors informed.

As a result of this integration, Sofology has seen an impressive 7x ROI from foot traffic in the back half of 2020 alone. The furniture company was also able to drive 33% year over year click growth in year one and a further 95% click growth in year two. 

Like many businesses across the UK, Sofology was managing listings on a channel-by-channel basis, with employees sporadically updating the likes of Google and Facebook on an ad-hoc basis while unable to manage many other search platforms. This combined with the brand’s growth and the opening of new stores was making it harder to keep customers informed throughout the pandemic.

Pandemic

With 80% of customers wishing to visit stores to complete the “sit test” before purchase, online listings also took on an even greater importance when the COVID-19 pandemic completely disrupted the customer purchase journey due to national and regional lockdowns.

Without a central platform to manage UK wide store listings, Sofology was unable to effectively inform customers of store hour changes and closures, which was crucial in enabling them to conduct the all-important “sit test” and complete their purchase.

Since implementation, Sofology’s Knowledge Graph, built on the Yext platform, now serves as a central source of truth for all of Sofology’s information, meaning information for every store, across over 200 search endpoints, are now accurate and up to date.

James Robinson, head of conversion rate optimisation at Sofology, said: “The ideal customer journey is to research online and then go to the store and do a sit test, so making store listings accurate was key in boosting conversion.”