Repaint a room. Refinish an antique coffee table. Prep the flower beds for winter. Do It Yourself? Sure, that would be great, but where do you start? That’s the question MARC USA and long-time client True Value Hardware aim to answer with the recent launch of two new sites: TrueValuePaint.com and StartRightStartHere.com. These innovative sites not only serve a real customer need, they also help bring business into True Value’s doors.
With 58% of Americans researching online before making purchasing decisions, it makes sense for True Value to showcase its expertise in the industry on the Web. These two new sites provide online DIY experiences for customers while they are still in the project planning stage – a process that begins online and finishes in-store.
When visitors first arrive at the homepage of TrueValuePaint.com, they are greeted with a blank white living room and an invitation to “Set the Mood” with color. They can then choose from six different “mood” living rooms that reflect a variety of design styles or take the True Value “Mood Quiz” to find the room that best reflects their personal preferences. Now the painting begins.
Guests can choose from pre-selected color palettes or create their own customized color combinations to better suit their tastes. Their color choices are reflected on the walls in the virtual room. To help them better imagine their painted room, visitors can even change various features of the room, such as the furniture, flooring and window treatments. The room updates, including the True Value paint color chips, can be saved in the user’s Project Box – then the contents can be printed and brought to True Value to help in making paint purchases.
StartRightStartHere.com offers visitors a completely customized experience. When customers arrive at the site, the site reads which region of the country they are logging in from, and they are immediately greeted with a virtual home modeled after the typical architectural style found in their geographic region. Guests are then brought to an overhead view of the house floor plan, where they can go from room-to-room, even outside, to find DIY inspiration. Each room contains project ideas with all of the instruction visitors need to complete a DIY project – even a True Value shopping list. Ideas are updated monthly, and projects are provided for both beginners and experienced do-it-yourselfers. Well-known DIY experts blog on StartRightStartHere.com to keep customers engaged and returning to the site again and again.
TrueValuePaint.com and StartRightStartHere.com provide an entertaining online experience for customers while also offering them the advice they need to make home projects happen – and building the brand loyalty that will keep these do-it-yourselfers shopping at True Value.
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