[Case Study] The #1 Problem Kitchen Cabinet Retailers Face And How to Solve It

Kitchen from our Showroom based in Cyprus

Kitchen Design is the biggest problem every Kitchen Cabinet Retailer has when it comes to selling Kitchen Cabinets.

It takes time to do, expertise, and the customer will not buy kitchen cabinets from you, unless he first sees his design in 3D.

How do we know?

We had this problem in our own carpentry, which is based in Cyprus.

This was the primary reason for building KitchenWhiz. We wanted an easy to use kitchen planner that anyone can use with NO expert design skills required.

Over the past few years, we discovered that KitchenWhiz works great for homeowners and can work great for our carpentry also.

I will explain how and show you some numbers to prove my claim below.

The Problem

In our carpentry, we offer kitchen design as a free service. A lot of Kitchen Cabinet Retailers do.

This attracts a lot of potential customers because they need your expert design skills and free kitchen planning service.

That’s great because you have people coming in your showroom.

These could be REAL potential clients… but in many cases, they are not!

Many will come to you to get their free kitchen plan… only to then pass your plan to your competitors for a cheaper price

This ends up wasting a lot of time and resources for your business.

With an increasing competitive environment in the sector, in order for you to survive, your business HAS to be more productive than ever.

That’s not even the real problem though.

The REAL problem is that these homeowners do not possess the design skills to design their kitchen plan on their own… because today’s design tools are too difficult to use and very time-consuming.

Just think about it…

It takes a professional designer 30-60 minutes to design a kitchen plan with professional software, which the homeowner does not have access to.

And it takes homeowners HOURS to design a kitchen plan with free drag-n-drop software available on the internet.

The IDEA

Here is how we solved this problem in our business.

Over the past few months, we had an “Aha moment”.

The idea was to add KitchenWhiz on our carpentry’s website, and send people there BEFORE they visit our showroom.

And so we did!

Here is how it works:

Step 1: Add Branded KitchenWhiz on our Site

We first embedded KitchenWhiz on our own website at gnicolaou.com/planner

We tried to make it as branded as possible.

This includes:

  • Adding our carpentry’s logo on on the top left
  • Branded plans downloaded in 2D/3D included our company’s information (such as Website, Street Address, and Phone Number)

Here is how it looks:

How it looks in the browser when the user is using the Kitchen Planner

How it looks when taking a screenshot in 3D. Note the logo and company info on the bottom corners.

PDF plan downloaded with all measurements and our Company’s information

Step 2: Include the Kitchen Planner in our Marketing Process

For this step, we did a few things.

We first linked to the kitchen planner from different pages on our website. For example, we link to the planner from the homepage, the kitchen cabinets page etc.

Then, we created a local facebook ad for people that already visited our website.

This means that people that are interested in our services, get to use the planner before visiting our showroom.

You may be wondering how we bring customers to our website in the first place?

We first promote our renovation projects on our blog using before/after pictures.

People that visit our blog get to see the below kitchen planner ad:

(The ad is in greek, because that is the language our customers speak, but basically we explain how the planner works and then link to the planner)

You could also run a facebook ad that targets every homeowner in your local area. This can work really well also despite people visiting your site already or not.

Why this works?

Because KitchenWhiz is easy to use for homeowners.

The numbers below prove this.

In November 2018, out of 295 users that tried KitchenWhiz on our website carpentry’s website, almost 52% managed to design their kitchen plan until the end.

These 152 users where able to fully generate their kitchen plan on their own with no help needed from an expert designer.

These 152 users are also local potential customers for our business.

The best thing? It took them ONLY 25 minutes on average to do so.

If it was any other kitchen tool, it would take them hours!

In the same period, we have been able to get 13 leads (potential customers) from our website alone… interested in buying their kitchen cabinets from us.

This does NOT include all the extra customers that prefered to give us a call or visit our showroom directly.

Benefits in adding KitchenWhiz to your website

You do get a lot of other benefits.

Potential customers that just want their kitchen cabinets designed do not waste your time.

Real potential customers will see you as an authority in the space.

Ask yourself. What kind of companies offer a kitchen planner in the industry today?

I can think of a few big and respected ones like Ikea, Wren Kitchens, Magnet (Uk), Home Depot, and Lowes… and many more.

When you are able to offer such a service for free to your customers, then your value goes up in their mind.

It gets easier to close more sales because trust in your brand is increased.

Constantinos Nicolaou

Co-founder & CEO at KitchenWhiz

Do you want to add KitchenWhiz on your website? Do you want to apply our carpentry’s marketing process and get more clients for your business?

Contact me at  constantinos@kitchenwhiz.com and I will be happy to help you achieve your business’ goals.