Branch

Background

Founded in 2019, Branch Furniture set out with a clear mission: to transform the grueling process of furnishing corporate offices into a seamless and delightful experience. As you can imagine, the company’s trajectory shifted dramatically in February 2020 when office work became essentially obsolete. Very quickly, Branch pivoted to a direct-to-consumer model, and began also focusing on delivering premium furniture tailored to the home office.

Erika Folk leads all things growth and eCommerce at Branch. Working closely with co-founder and CPO Sib Mahapatra and Full Stack Developer Alex Schneck, they are an incredibly data-driven team, seeking to continuously optimize their site with designs and experiences backed by data.

Complex Buyer Journeys - shoppers often conduct extensive research and make several visits to the site before committing to a purchase.
Demand for Personalization - engaging shoppers with tailored content and experiences is crucial to driving conversions.
Resource Constraints - with a lean team, Branch prefers solutions that can deliver impactful results without overwhelming internal resources.

Historically, Branch relied on Google Optimize for A/B testing and CRO efforts. But when the tool was deprecated in late 2023, Branch was forced to find another solution. Seeking the most scalable and sophisticated tools, Branch naturally explored options like Optimizely and VWO. However, like many brands, Branch faces constraints in both budget and technical resources, making it difficult to justify these solutions.

Everything changed when Erika stumbled upon Visually - she understood immediately that it was the perfect platform for Branch:

User Friendly: The visual editor allows Branch’s eCommerce team to easily create powerful experiences, enabling faster test deployment and freeing up development resources for other priorities.
Advanced Personalization: The ability to create granular audience segments based on real time shopping behavior enables Branch to deliver highly relevant experiences to very specific groups of shoppers.
Expertise & Collaboration: Visually’s CRO team provides hands-on support and strategy, guiding Branch through test ideation, development, and iteration.

Outcome

Partnering with Visually has entirely transformed Branch’s approach to CRO and a/b testing. Here are some of Erika’s favorite experiences to date

HOMEPAGE PERSONALIZATION

Erika and the team are aware that shoppers may visit the Branch site multiple times before actually checking out - that is simply the nature of high AOV purchases. Yet, these shoppers should be served a different experience than first time visitors, something Branch has struggled to implement in the past.

With Visually, Branch was able to display a recommended products slider on the homepage, though just for shoppers who visited the site in the last 60 days. The team decided to include five products in the slider, and implemented an advanced ruling strategy to determine which specific products would be placed in each one of the five product slots.

It was clear within just a few days that this was a winner. Branch saw an 8.9% increase in conversion rate, as well as a 21.2% increase in revenue per session. While this recommended products slider now lives as a core part of the homepage for returning shoppers, Erika and the team will look to further optimize the slider by testing out different algorithms, styling, and number of products.

CHECKOUT REVIEWS

The Ergonomic Chair is one of Branch’s flagship products, and is therefore a focal point when considering onsite optimizations. Its product page is bolstered by high quality images, videos, reviews, and descriptions. However, once the chair is actually added to cart or checkout, there are no efforts to further endorse the product or encourage the shopper to purchase.

Visually’s CRO experts noticed this could be leading to checkout abandonment and a dropoff in conversion rate. They suggested a simple, yet powerful solution: including a product review for the Ergonomic Chair in checkout.

With Visually’s custom audiences and checkout blocks, this test took just minutes to set up and launch. The result? A staggering 16.5% uplift in conversion rate!

Now, Branch will look to add checkout reviews for all of their other flagship products.

NEW PRODUCT LAUNCH

Branch is constantly innovating and launching new products to their site. To make the most out of their product launches, Erika works closely with Visually to build out tailored shopping experiences.
One of the challenges with new product launches is the lack of social proof, since the product has no purchase history, and therefore zero reviews to showcase. In fact, it may even be concerning to shoppers if they see a product that has no reviews at all.

Instead, Visually recommended that Branch hide the reviews on their new Ergonomic Chair Pro, replacing the widget with the number of shoppers who purchased the product in the past week. This was particularly strategic because the new product is likely to sell quickly during launch, which would then display a very high number of shoppers who recently purchased the product, further contributing to its appeal.

Indeed, that was the case, as this test showed a 4.3% increase in conversion rate compared to the review widget. It was an incredibly insightful learning experience for Erika, and something she will continue to leverage in future product launches.

PRODUCT PAGE VIDEOS

Videos have become a cornerstone of eCommerce websites, whether on landing pages, the homepage, or product pages. They’re inherently more engaging than static images and provide an excellent way to highlight a product’s benefits and use cases.

Branch had already been using interactive videos on their product pages, but Visually’s team identified an opportunity: the videos were positioned too far down the page, meaning many shoppers likely missed them.

With Visually, Branch was able to seamlessly reposition their videos more prominently on the page, right beneath the add to cart button. The result? A measurable boost in performance - 4.5% increase in conversion rate and a 9.4% increase in revenue per session.

Having seen incredibly favorable results, Branch can now justify the investment in product videos of additional products to feature on their pages.

Visually has become more than just a vendor for Branch; it’s an extension of their team. Visually’s cutting-edge platform combined with Branch’s commitment to data-driven decision-making has empowered Branch to navigate the complexities of onsite optimization with confidence and success.

For anyone looking for a CRO partner that combines technical expertise with genuine investment in your business success, Visually is an excellent choice. They've become an invaluable extension of our team, consistently delivering value through thoughtful optimization strategies and data-driven recommendations.

Erika Folk - Director of Growth at Branch

How Branch Generated +900X ROI With Visually

Background

Challenges

Outcome