How BUT is accelerating digital transformation with WhatsApp catalogs

BUT is a leading home furnishing retailer with over 330 stores in France. About 80% of French people live less than 20 minutes away from a BUT store! 

Their mission? Giving everyone the opportunity to bring their dream interior to life, wherever they are, no matter their budget, and without compromising on quality. 

Challenge: Minimizing the use of paper catalogs while boosting customer engagement 

When BUT set out to optimize their media mix by digitizing their direct mail catalogs, they had three main goals in mind: driving more traffic and conversions, minimizing the use of paper to reduce printing costs and respond to CSR issues, and of course, meeting customers’ growing demand for digital catalogs. According to a recent Ipsos survey for Meta, 70% of French people prefer digital leaflets to paper. 

Plus, with the introduction of the “Oui Pub” (“Yes to advertising”) pilot program in France, the distribution of direct mail promotions to consumers who haven’t actively granted their consent is now prohibited in several French cities, reinforcing the need for a digital alternative.  

But how do you transition away from paper catalogs after 50 years of use while still catering to individual communication preferences and maintaining a high level of customer engagement? 

Solution: Enabling one-click access to BUT’s digital catalogs with WhatsApp  

BUT turned to Sinch to help them future-proof and enhance their media mix. With its massive reach and rich features — which not only include catalogs, but also broadcast messages, quick-reply buttons, e-commerce cart notifications, and more — WhatsApp was an obvious choice to engage BUT customers with a seamless browsing experience. 

"WhatsApp is an innovative channel that allows us to communicate in a very smooth and interactive way. Our customers can access BUT’s weekly promotions on their favorite app with the click of a button,” explained Sonia DAHECH, Omnichannel, Traffic, and Data Director at BUT. 

Customers now receive BUT’s latest catalog every week via WhatsApp, allowing them to browse new products on their own terms with easy access to their history. 

The WhatsApp Business platform also gives the BUT team access to valuable customer behavioral data like message read rates and click-through rates. 

Results: Unmatched customer engagement — for today and tomorrow 

Switching to WhatsApp catalogs empowered the BUT team to more effectively monitor and optimize the performance of each catalog — and the results they’ve achieved so far are promising, to say the least: 70% transformation rate for inbound campaigns.

“The engagement on each push is impressive,” said Sonia DAHECH. “We're delighted with these initial results! We've already started using it for commercial operations and we're planning to test more advanced and conversational marketing use cases in the future.” 

Learn more about WhatsApp here.