Becoming Western Canada's Favourite Tile Store.
Tile Town has an amazing team and a strong brand, but their website didn't show it. Clunky and confusing, Tile Town's online presence didn't resonate with or serve its audience, resulting in low visitation and high drop-off rates. They needed a website that matched their brand.
- 1st page Google ranking in all Tile Town cities when searching for 'tile stores'
- +27.5% Website sessions over previous year
- 1000+ Submissions for their first online promotion, Italian Days
- +88% Mobile users over previous year
Founded in Alberta in 1971, Tile Town has 5 locations across Western Canada. Unlike other tile stores, they're not simply a retailer or stuffy showroom: the people at Tile Town work one-on-one with their customers to plan and design their perfect space, and find the best solution for their budget. Tile Town President and owner Mike Scardina came to us by referral from another ODG client. He knew he needed a better website, but he didn't know where to start.
Welcoming, engaged, considerate, knowledgeable and trustworthy. Those words are the five foundations of the Tile Town philosophy. Their people live those words every day, but that couldn't be said for their website which was confusing, cluttered and clunky.
Through a deep discovery process, we learned everything we could about their business and built an online presence that better aligned with the Tile Town philosophy.
Overview + Planning
All websites should have a goal. Like most retailer websites, our goal was to convert casual online browsers into real life walk-in customers.
After learning all we could about Tile Town and its vision, we created a list of goals we wanted to achieve that would make for a better online experience for Tile Town customers and draw them to visit their closest Tile Town location.
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Show the experience
Shopping at Tile Town is an engaging, inspiring and tactile experience. This should be reflected on the website. -
Fresh new design
Tile Town's website should be as warm and welcoming as its people. It should encourage people to visit store locations. -
Mobile friendly
More consumers do research on the go and on the couch. A fast and intuitive mobile experience is key. -
Better ads
Their online ads weren't drawing visitors. They needed to restrategize and retarget. -
SEO optimization
There are a lot of tile stores to choose from, and we had to be on the first page of common search terms.
Challenge:
Search Engine Rankings
There are many tile stores in Western Canada, and many more vying for the first page in Google. To be competitive, the new Tile Town website needed more than just a fresh design. It needed strategic search engine optimization.
Keep scrolling to see the solutionTile Town's previous website had a lot of tile. Tile categories, with tile galleries, of tile products. But it was missing something.
Between the tile centres and the big box home improvement stores, it's easy enough to find tile. But finding the right tile? That's a different story.
Tile Town is more than a tile centre: it's a complete tile shopping experience.
Tile Town has hundreds of exclusive Italian tile designs and thousands of feet of product ready to take home, but they also have friendly, talented and professional in-store designers ready to help customers plan their space and pick the tile that works best for them.
That is what was missing: The people behind the business.
Changing the Message
We imagined potential customers would visit the Tile Town website to answer a number of questions beyond what they might have in stock: What is Tile Town all about? Can I browse their selection? Will they help me? Where do I start? What is the process like? Will it be easy to find what I want? What can I expect? Will I succeed?
The new website had to reassure the customer with answers, and show that Tile Town is welcoming, local, connected, approachable, knowedgeable, engaged, and trustworthy. In short: Western Canada's favourite tile store.
Features
Photography: Showing, Not Telling
We arranged and directed a photoshoot to show what makes Tile Town special: their exclusive, quality tile and, more importantly, their people and they way they guide the customer experience.
We spent several days at multiple Tile Town locations photographing the team engaging with and guiding customers. With such a great bunch of people, it was easy to find genuine moments of laughter and connection.
Below: a slide from our initial mood board presentation, establishing photo shoot goals.
Video
Videos are a great way to show a company's personality and make a stronger connection with customers. We produced two videos where, in just a few minutes, customers can gain a better understanding of Tile Town's philosophy and the people behind it.
Tile Town's History and Philosophy
Meet Carol, Design Consultant at the Tile Town Surrey location.
Full Screen Navigation
The Tile Town website had to showcase hundreds of different tile products in seven different categories, but that's just the beginning. It also had to feature installation products, a robust idea gallery, case studies, a store locator, an in-depth help section, and an active social media feed.
All that content can be overwhelming, so we had to make it easy to navigate with clean, organized and intuitive navigation. A full-screen menu lets customers find what they're looking for quickly, and perhaps discover products and ideas that they hadn't previously considered.
Tile Collections
The Tile Collections pages had to be clean, organized and easy to navigate so customers could find the best solution as quickly as possible.
We cut out the clutter and focused on the content, with a straightforward submenu, a handy search field and large thumbnails.
Town Square
Sorting through hundreds of tiles can be daunting, and customers need all the help they can get to browse, organize, and select the products that fit their space. Enter Town Square, a custom-built online tool designed to make tile shopping easier.
Town Square provides a central place for customers to collect inspiration images, upload photos of their space, and save their favourite tiles from the website. Tile Town designers can then work with the customer in-store to plan their space and make their purchase.
Store Locations
If you want customers to visit your store, you need make it not only easy to find, but as welcoming as possible.
Each Tile Town Showroom Location page includes a location map, actual photos of the friendly staff, and a handy summary of the languages offered, services and hours.
Mobile
Analytics made it clear that having a mobile friendly website was a must. We wireframed and designed the new Tile Town website with mobility in mind, ensuring customers could easily browse the site, add products to Town Square and find showrooms quickly and easily.
Mobile users over previous year
Italian Days
Italian Days Promotion
After a successful website launch that saw a 27.5% increase in traffic over the previous year, the folks at Tile Town wanted our help with their first ever online enter-to-win promotion, Italian Days.
With only a week to produce the landing and registration page, online ads, website banners and corresponding in-store collateral, Tile Town was thrilled to receive over 1000 entries, along with hundreds of new followers and newsletter subscribers.
Campaign Display Ads
Weekly Winners
Search Engine Optimization
We always design our websites and write our copy with keywords in mind. Tile Town was no different. Through the use of keyword-rich copy, strategic coding, and good SEO practices, we were able to increase Tile Town's standing, establishing a first-page position.
The previous Tile Town website was focused on generic terms such as "floor tile Vancouver". Tile Town has no Vancouver locations and that word won't be found on their website, making it near impossible to rank highly.
The phrase "tile stores" was chosen as our primary target as it indicates this is an active customer looking to shop now and is not limited to a single geographical area.
Our new primary keyword target of "tile stores" currently ranks 1st page (4th-5th) in the cities in which Tile Town is located.
Pay Per Click (PPC) Campaign
Sometimes organic search results aren't enough, and you need a little more visual impact to get your customers' attention.
But a good PPC campaign needs more than a budget to work as intended. It needs eye-catching imagery, a relevant message, and a solid strategy.
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Efficient Spending
First, we eliminated spending on the keywords that had good natural search engine rankings, like "Tile Town." This alone freed up a significant portion of their monthly budget.
Why pay for terms that get clicks naturally? Ad spend should be focused elsewhere.
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Better Targeting
Generic search terms like "floor tile" don't tell us what kind of user this person is. Are they just searching for a few images or ideas, or are they actively shopping now? Maybe they're an interior designer, or perhaps they're just looking for inspiration.
But add a city name to the query—"floor tile Richmond," for example—and it changes everything. Suddenly we have a clear indication that the user is actively shopping and might be ready to visit their local Tile Town showroom.
The new Tile Town display ads are simple, engaging and to-the-point: friendly people in tile stores near you that are ready to help you find the perfect tile for your space.
Successes
In December 2018, Tile Town invited our entire company out for a celebratory lunch. It was a nice gesture that we all very much enjoyed.
Since launching the new MyTileTown.ca, we've expanded our relationship even further. ODG has continued to invest multiple hours into their project each month for new promotions and campaigns, and provide ongoing consultation and suggestions for PPC campaigns and SEO.
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