dunhill sees a 62% increase in average visit value using Nosto to drive sales for their new capsule collection

About dunhill

A design driven brand, with style, substance and purpose; engineering unique luxuries for men. Founded in 1893 when Alfred Dunhill took over his father’s harness manufacturing business, Alfred developed and invented products for the emerging motoring industry to meet the needs of a new generation.

Today, dunhill is a leading British luxury menswear brand with a global retail and digital presence, led by the vision of Creative Director, Mark Weston and CEO, Andrew Maag.

Leather and craftsmanship is as integral today, as it was 125 years ago. In the leather workshops in London’s Walthamstow and in Italy, dunhill upholds the tradition of considered craft. The business continues to be driven forward by the founder’s long-established mantra: “It must be useful, it must work dependably, it must be beautiful, it must last, it must be the best of its kind”.

The Challenge

The Aquarium capsule collection, although inspired by one of dunhill’s iconic table lighters, is a contemporary take on the design. Its bold illustrations and colours needed to be handled and curated differently and sensitively for different dunhill customer types.

The approach: Strongly promote the full capsule to customers it would most appeal to, while delivering a more classic content experience to more ‘traditional’ customers.

In May 2019, dunhill successfully used Nosto’s AI-powered personalization – including its innovative Segmentation and Insights and Content Personalization technology – to support the launch of its new Aquarium collection.

The Solution

Pre-launch, Dunhill used Nosto to create unique customer segments, offering tailored experiences on its website. Nosto’s technology combines transactional and behavioral data to identify segments based on criteria like customer lifecycle stage, top-selling locations, categories, and device types.

For Dunhill, four key segments were created:

VIC segment: Existing loyal customers
‘Traditional’ segment: Customers less likely to engage with the Aquarium collection
‘Early access’ segment: Customers who signed up for early access
All other customers

Segmentation helped Dunhill target VIC customers with a strong affinity for the new Aquarium collection and the Traditional segment with content featuring classic styles.

A personalized countdown timer on the homepage highlighted the Aquarium launch date. VIC and early-access customers saw a countdown reduced by 24 hours to enhance exclusivity.

To reinforce branding before the launch, VIC customers were shown a video of a model in the new collection, and an ‘Exclusive’ category was added to the site navigation for them and early-access customers.

After the launch of the collection, beneath a personalized home banner, visitors were shown Nosto’s personalized recommendations which led them directly to Aquarium product pages. On category pages, the Aquarium ‘dancing model’ was shown to all customers except those in the Traditional segment.

dunhill’s homepage delivered two distinct shopping experiences after the launch:

The Traditional segment was fuelled by content related more to the categories these shoppers have historically browsed. Aquarium was still promoted, but in a more subtle way with a hero banner featuring Aquarium, followed by the ‘Leather Edit’ and new arrivals.
Everyone else was shown an ‘Aquarium Takeover’ homepage which heavily featured Aquarium content: bright colors and bold prints with a ‘shop now’ banner CTA.

Additionally, the ‘Exclusive’ category within the navigation was replaced with ‘Aquarium’ (shown to all except Traditional customers)

Results

Together, dunhill and Nosto have driven a significant uplift in ecommerce performance by creating distinct customer segments, targeting shoppers with fully personalised online experiences. dunhill’s personalisation strategy has resulted in:

a 62% increase in average visit value
a 31% in online conversion rate
a 15% increase in average order value

Other case studies

How Casio streamlines product discovery & encourages shoppers to buy direct

How JOTT doubled conversions by improving its product discovery journey on Shopify

PELAGIC’s Journey to Increased Sales & Engagement through Nosto’s CX Optimization Services

Colorful Conversions: How Show Me Your Mumu Boosted AOV by 20% with Nosto’s Product Recommendations