The Fast Lane
Discover the world of AI-driven shopping optimization and fast-track your way to increased conversion rates, AOV, and customer loyalty. Explore expert insights on e-commerce personalization, merchandising, site search, and more.
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Search & discoveryAdvanced Search in WooCommerce: Elevate Your E-Commerce GameAdvanced search in WooCommerce can significantly elevate your e-commerce store, enhance your customers' experience on your store, and drive sales. This robust search functionality helps your customers quickly find what they're looking for by searching for specific products, categories, attributes, and even custom fields.
What Is Advanced Search In WooCommerce?
Advanced search in WooCommerce allows your customers to refine their product searches by using a number of filters and parameters.
Your customers can narrow their search by selecting several parameters, such as the type of goods, features, price range, and so on. This type of e-commerce search process is simplified and more efficient, which in turn improves the user experience.
How Advanced Search Improves Your WooCommerce Store
Show Relevant Results Instantly
When you use advanced search in WooCommerce, your website's search function can return relevant results almost immediately, making it easy for shoppers to find what they need.
This is especially true if you have a large product catalog. Your customers don't want to search endlessly through collections and product lists. Instead, advanced search can save them time and effort because your customers can easily filter search results by keywords, product features, price range, and more.
Bamboo Clothing: Get an Instant Perfect Fit
Bamboo Clothing sells sustainable men's and women's activewear. Their customers can search by size, color, brand, and price. These advanced search tools allow their customers to quickly locate the products they want without browsing through irrelevant merchandise. For example, a customer found relevant results instantly when typing in "large women tops".
Also note how the search function gave relevant results even though the customer didn't use the exact same wording as the store ("top" vs "jacket"). Its natural language search capabilities take synonyms and misspellings into consideration to continually provide an optimized shopping experience.
Product Searches Anywhere on Your Site
Since 43% of your customers immediately start their shopping journey with your search bar, it should be available to them throughout their entire shopping journey on your store.
Easy access to your search bar means your customers are more likely to stay on your site and explore more pages. They may even stumble across products they didn't know you had or are better than what they were originally looking for, giving you the ideal chance to upsell and cross-sell. Additionally, increased stay time and engagement show search engines that your site is important and relevant to users, which can boost your ranking.
Gourmet Basket: Not Putting It All in One Basket
Gourmet Basket specializes in compiling luxurious gift baskets. If a customer browses a specific collection (like "Non-Alcoholic Gift Baskets"), the search bar remains easily accessible at the top of the page if the customer wants to search for something else. Within the collection, various filters are available to refine the customer's search more, thereby giving them more options and encouraging them to stay on the page.
» Learn how product search engines and federated search can enhance your store today
Live Search and Autocomplete
Live search and autocomplete give your customers a faster, more convenient, and more efficient way to find and purchase products on your store because it automatically provides suggestions based on what your customers are typing.
This can not only save time, but also helps avoid spelling mistakes that could result in a "no results" page. In this way, you can lower your bounce rates and increase conversions because you're leading your customers on a straight path to their desired products.
Wowmart: Finishing Your Sentences
Wowmart sells various health and beauty products. If a customer is looking for "shampoo", the store automatically provides various popular, category, and product suggestions for them to consider and peruse.
Tailored Product Search
Because you're interacting with your customers through an interface now instead of face-to-face, it's even more important to make them feel special. And giving them a personalized shopping experience tailored to their preferences is the perfect way to do this.
By making your customers part of the process, you can increase your sales by 6-10% because at least 51% of your customers are more likely to buy a product if you add a personal touch to their shopping journey.
Protest: No Objections to Personalized Search Results
Protest sells clothing for men, women, and children. If a customer searches for "black top", then they get relevant results from all categories including summer and winter clothing as well as for men, women, and children. But a personalized shopping experience can refine these results, e.g., black tops for women of a specific price and size.
» Discover more about personalized search and recommendation engines
Fast Opportunities
WooCommerce stores need advanced searches to improve product discoverability and user experience. This includes delivering quick and accurate search results to your customers, giving them the opportunity to further refine their searches, and personalizing their shopping journey.
An effective search function can potentially double your conversions, build customer loyalty, and increase your sales.
Search & discoveryUnleash the Power of Custom Site Search: A Guide to Better E-Commerce NavigationWhen you run an e-commerce store, you want to provide your customers with a seamless shopping experience that keeps them coming back for more. That's where custom site search comes in to make it easier for your customers to navigate your store.
By taking advantage of custom site search, you can set your e-commerce store apart from the competition. Custom site search helps you provide a personalized and efficient search experience for your customers so you can drive sales, improve your customer experience, and boost customer loyalty.
Let's dive into how you can take advantage of custom site search on your e-commerce site.
What Is Custom Site Search?
Custom site search is a search tool that gives you advanced features beyond the basic search functionality most e-commerce platforms offer.
With custom site search, you can provide your customers with quick and easy access to the products they're looking for while delivering a smooth and personalized shopping experience.
Alora Boutique: Making It Easier to Find the Perfect Jewelry
If your customer is looking for a specific earring they saw on social media, they'll head to your e-commerce site and start searching. With a custom site search, they can type in the name of the jewelry and receive a list of all the earrings that match it. This eliminates the need for your customer to navigate through different categories and endlessly scroll through product options, especially if you have hundreds of products on your site.
Benefits of a Custom Site Search
Improved Customer Experience
No matter your industry, customers want the best shopping experience possible. You can deliver on that by implementing a custom site search that offers a more visually appealing shopping experience. If your e-commerce site sells clothing, you can incorporate custom site search to display product images in the search results, making it easier for customers to identify the product they're looking for.
Relevant Search Results
Custom site search is typically powered by AI algorithms that understand the intent behind each customer's search query, delivering relevant results every time. If a customer has recently searched for a specific type of product on your site, a custom site search can remember their preferences and suggest relevant products when they come back and explore your site later in their buying journey. Having relevant search results saves your customers time, makes it easier for them to find what they're looking for, and increases the likelihood of them making a purchase.
Increased Sales
By providing your customers with a fast and personalized shopping experience, custom site search can help drive sales and increase your bottom line. For example, at Alora Boutique, having search on the site has been instrumental in helping shoppers find the products they need, resulting in a higher conversion rate and average order value.
The best part about a custom site search is that you can see what products people are searching for on your site and match your product descriptions to their search intent or introduce new products that customers are looking for, but you don't have.
Custom Site Search Features That Improve Navigation
Smarter Search
When it comes to optimizing your site, custom site search is the way of the future. Your team can leverage advanced AI algorithms that understand the intent behind each search query, delivering relevant results every time. Custom search helps your team rest easy, knowing your customers won't have to sort through irrelevant results, saving time and reducing headaches.
For example, if a customer searches Alora Boutique for "black hoop earrings" using a custom site search, they'll receive a specific list of black hoop earrings shoes instead of all earrings in general. A good search tool can also consider factors like product popularity, categories, and product reviews to provide even more accurate results.
This level of intelligence ensures that your customers can find what they're looking for faster and more efficiently, leading to a more enjoyable shopping experience and a higher likelihood of purchase. This can result in higher customer satisfaction and, ultimately, customer retention.
Personal Customized Style
Merchandising a site is painstaking, and luckily custom site searches can be tailored to match the look and feel of your brand. Doing this will ensure your customers have a consistent shopping experience.
For example, at Alora Boutique, I customized my custom site search to match the website's aesthetics, creating a seamless shopping experience for their customers.
Full Search Result Control
With custom site search, you and your team have complete control over the displayed search results. Are you having a sale? You can prioritize certain products. Big holiday collections you need visible in Q4? You can prioritize these collections in your search results. Doing this ensures that your customers can quickly and easily find what they're looking for, and you improve the sales of certain products.
Do Your Custom Site Search the Fast Way
By incorporating custom site search into your e-commerce strategy, you can provide your customers with a highly personalized and efficient shopping experience, driving sales and customer loyalty in the process. With an integrated AI platform, you can implement and maintain custom site search effortlessly.
So why wait? Unleash the power of custom site search today and take your e-commerce store to the next level!
» Have a B2B website? Here's how to optimize site search for B2B
Search & discoveryAdvanced Search in Magento: Improve Your Store's ExperienceAdvanced search is a powerful tool that can significantly improve the functionality and performance of your Magento store, leading to increased customer satisfaction, conversions, and sales.
Consider that 43% of your customers immediately zero in on the search bar to find information, but 21% of them can exit your site again from the search results — possibly because they didn't find what they're looking for and are searching for another store to buy from.
But with its range of features, advanced search can help your customers find what they're looking for quickly and conveniently, making it easier for them to complete purchases.
What Is Advanced Search?
Advanced search in e-commerce refers to a sophisticated and feature-rich search system that gives your customers multiple ways to refine their search and increase their chances of getting the results they want.
This can include searching by product attributes, price range, brand, or category. Advanced search also often includes autocomplete and spelling features to make sure your customers still get their desired results even if they make mistakes in their search terms.
Give Your Customers the Best Magento Experience
Having advanced search in your Magento store can give you an advantage over your competitors, considering that 61% of e-commerce stores perform below expectations when it comes to search.
Here's how advanced search can improve your store's experience:
Language Recognition
It always comes down to semantics, right? You can give your customers a better shopping experience when you up your language game.
Support multiple languages
When your customers search for products in their preferred language, it can enhance the relevancy and accuracy of their search results. Your customers search more intuitively and find the process more user-friendly, especially if they're not fluent in the default language of your store.Account for language mistakes
Your customers may make typos in the search bar or completely misspell a product name. Advanced search can take this into account and make sure that your customers still get the search results they want — instead of a "No Results" page.
The flexibility that you get from language recognition means your customers can easily find what they need without sifting through irrelevant results. This can help to increase customer satisfaction and, subsequently, sales.
Everten: Spelling of Search Terms
Everten sells various kitchenware. Their search results for 'fry pan' and 'frypan' are the same, so it doesn't matter if you spell it as two words or one.
Multiple Types of Content
Magento allows you to create and manage various types of content such as product descriptions, blog articles, pages, and more. You can also use Magento's built-in rich-text editor to enhance the formatting and presentation of your content.
Advanced search gives you an extra advantage by making sure your customers find all of your content quickly.
Cater to non-product searches
Your search results won't be restricted to products only. Your customers can also view related blog posts, reviews, subscriptions, etc. Use your internal search bar as a gateway
Your search bar is central to your store and can be the first point of contact with your customers. By making it a gateway, your customers can easily access their desired information from this one point. They don't have to scroll aimlessly through information or click on several tabs.
Liebherr: Diverse Search Results
Liebherr is an international group that manufactures equipment and technology for various industries. Just by searching for 'refrigeration', multiple search results from various places on the website appear. For example, products, company profile, and magazines. A very useful filter on the left allows you to refine your search even more.
Advanced Sorting
Advanced sorting means your customers can sort their search results according to their preference instead of the default sorting option in your Magento store.
Support your customer's end goal
Your customer is visiting your store with a purpose, for example, to buy a gift. Advanced sorting can help them achieve this faster. If they're on a budget, they can sort the results according to price. Similarly, if they don't know the person well, they can sort the results according to popularity.
Zachys: Refined Search Results Sorting
Zachys specializes in wine and liquor. After using the filters on the left, you can use the advanced sorting option on the right to organize your search results according to top rated, product name, high and low pricing, or relevance.
Do It the Fast Way
Expecting quick and accurate search results is part of your customers' online behavior. With advanced search features, like what we just discussed, you can easily provide this to them on your Magento store.
Creating an optimized site search experience can encourage your customers to convert more, which will also boost your average order value.
» Further enhance your site search with this ultimate guide to internal search
Search & discoveryGuide to Shopify Search Bar: Add, Customize, Troubleshoot, Remove and MoreAs a leading e-commerce platform, Shopify offers its users a variety of tools and features to help them sell their products online, including a search bar. You may have heard about the advantages of Shopify's search bar, like maximizing product discoverability, but you're unsure about its technicalities. In this guide, we provide easy-to-follow steps so you can effortlessly add, customize, troubleshoot, or remove your Shopify search bar.
Why Is the Shopify Search Bar Important?
Shopify's search bar gives your customers a quick and easy way to find the products they're looking for, which ultimately results in an enhanced shopping experience for them. By reducing the time it takes to find a product, your customers are 2-3 times more likely to convert. A good and functional search bar can therefore lead to:
Improved customer experienceIncreased brand recognition, loyalty, and social proofBetter product discoveryIncreased sales
How to Add Your Shopify Search Bar
First, you need to get your Shopify search bar up and running. There are two paths you can choose: enable this function directly in your Shopify store or via a third-party app.
Enable Your Shopify Search Bar in Your Shopify Store
Please note that you can only follow this method if your Shopify theme supports it.
Log into your Shopify account and navigate to your admin page.Click on "Themes".
Click on "Theme Editor" or "Customize" depending on your setup.
Click on "Theme Settings" and navigate to "Add-Ons".
Locate the search add-on in the list and check the box to activate it.
If you can't find this in your theme settings, then your theme most likely doesn't support a search functionality. But not to worry! You can just as easily add a Shopify search bar through an app.
Add Your Shopify Search Bar via an App
Go to your Shopify dashboard and log in to your account.Click on the "Apps" section on the left-side menu and visit the Shopify App Store.Search for "search bar apps" and you'll see apps like Fast Simon.
Install the app and follow the installation instructions to add the app to your Shopify store.Go to the app's settings to configure the search bar. Click on "Save" to apply the changes.Go to your website and test the search bar to ensure that it's working correctly.
Adding a search bar will help your customers find their ideal products quickly and easily, thereby improving their overall shopping and user experience.
How to Customize Your Shopify Search Bar
Now that you've added your Shopify search bar, you can start customizing it.
Log in to your Shopify account and click on "Online Store".Click on "Themes".
Find the theme you want to edit and click on "Customize".
Click on "Search Bar".Change the search bar settings and save to update.
Customization is important because it gives your store a certain look and feel. This includes changing the search suggestions, result display settings, and whether the product description should be available in the results.
How to Remove Your Shopify Search Bar
Removing your Shopify search bar will depend on how you added it; directly in your Shopify store via its theme or with a third-party app.
Remove Your Shopify Search Bar in Your Shopify Store
Log into your Shopify account.Navigate to "Themes".
Click on "Actions" and select "Edit Code".
Navigate to the list of codes and select icon-search.liquid.
Delete the code in the section.
Remove Your Shopify Search Bar via an App
Log into your Shopify account.Click on "Apps" to review the list of apps installed on your store.
Click the delete icon of the app you want to remove.
Click "Uninstall".
Removing your Shopify search bar may seem strange, considering its advantages. But perhaps you have a limited number of products, so your customers don't use the search option, or your website is just one page with minimal navigation.
How to Troubleshoot Common Shopify Search Bar Issues
Here are some common problems your Shopify search bar may encounter and their quick solutions.
Search Icon Issues
The most common issue comes with the search icon. Normally on mobile devices, the search bar won’t appear until your customer clicks on the magnifying glass icon. If they have connectivity issues and the icon doesn't load, then the search bar will always be kept hidden.
Tip: Try clearing your cache, checking your theme, or reverting to the previous update.
Theme-Specific Issues
Popular themes like Venture or Debut come with a hidden search bar for mobile devices, and when the themes are upgraded or changed manually, search bar issues can happen.
Tip: Try reverting to old updates or contacting the theme developers.
Benefits of the Shopify Search Bar
There are several benefits associated with the Shopify search bar. Some of them are:
Improved product catalog
With search analytics, you can understand which products are in demand and push them as per your customer’s previous search history, thereby giving them a personalized shopping experience.Improved Shopify SEO
Your search pages can be a great source of SEO-optimized links that will improve your website’s ranking in search results.Design marketing campaigns
Knowing your customer’s search data can help you launch relevant promotional campaigns and give you opportunities for upselling and cross-selling.Improve product linking
Understanding your customers' search intent means you can add relevant search keywords to your search functionality, products, and collections to ensure your customers' search results are more tightly knit.
Start Your Search Today
In a nutshell, the Shopify search bar is one of the greatest aspects of your store's success and can be the game changer in your Shopify store’s performance. Once added, you can leverage the benefits from more specialized search functionalities like federated search and predictive search. As you've seen, adding and managing your Shopify search bar is easy and fast, so start optimizing your Shopify store today.
Search & discoveryAdd Product Filters to Shopify: A Step-By-Step GuideOne of the most important factors behind the success of any Shopify store is adding product filters. This way, your customers can refine their search results and find their intended products faster by applying different criteria, such as product type, size, color, or price. Product filters can therefore help to improve user experience and sales. Here is a step-by-step to add a product filter to your Shopify store.
What Is a Product Filter?
A product filter is a tool that allows your customers to narrow down a wide array of products and find the ones they're looking for quickly and efficiently.
This extremely beneficial navigation tool streamlines your customers' shopping experience because by simply clicking a few buttons to enable the right filters, they can easily find the right products at their fingertips. For example, if a customer wants to buy a red shirt within a certain price range, they can select the “red” and “price” filters, and the search results will be narrowed down to just red shirts that meet the specific price criteria.
Product filters can also improve the product catalog of your store and increase the visibility of certain products, resulting in a better shopping experience for your customer and higher sales for you.
How to Add the Filters to Your Shopify Store
There are two different processes to add product filters to a Shopify store: one is for desktop and the other is for mobile. There are also two types of filters you can add.
Basic or default filters include options like primary price, vendor, and product type. These filters work with any store and you can add up to 5 to your store. Advanced or custom filters depend on the type of products you sell, so you'll use your product variants to determine which custom filters you need. You can add up to 20 of these filters to your store.
On Your Desktop
First, you need to check which filters are available to you based on your store theme. Once checked, you have to enable the “filters” mode from navigation. Now, you can start adding filters to your store.
Go to your Shopify Admin and click on “Online Store”. Click on “Navigation” and find the section named “Collection and search filters”. Click on the “Add filters” button.
You'll see a list of available filters. Select as many as you want. Click “Done” and save to update.
On Your Mobile
Adding product filters on Shopify through mobile is quite easy and very similar to the process on your desktop.
Install the Shopify app and log in.
Go to the sales channel section and click "Online store". Click on "Navigation" and find your way all the way down to "Collection and search filters".Click "Add filters" and you'll see a list of available filters. Select as many as you want and click "Done" to save and update.
Importance of Filtering Your Products
Product filtering is an important factor for e-commerce businesses because it not only helps to improve your customers’ search experience but also helps to enhance navigation, which ultimately increases your chances of making sales.
Filtering can also be beneficial for your product organization because the more product filters your store has, the more your customers are satisfied by its great look and feel.
» Make sure your filters are the best: Here's how to optimize e-commerce filters
Simon Says Automate Your Filters
Overall, product filters are an essential part of online stores that have a large number of products and want their customers to have an extraordinary search experience.
But we know that manually creating filters can take a lot of time and money, especially if a developer is involved. Instead, consider automatically generating filters for your Shopify store. Once generated, these filters are fully customizable so they can suit your store and brand. Just choose the filters you want to use to drive your store forward.
» Learn more about automated filters here
Search & discoveryWooCommerce Instant Search Makes Browsing a Breeze—Here’s HowWooCommerce is a leading e-commerce platform that allows users to create and manage online stores by offering a variety of features such as inventory management, shipping and tax options, and customer management. But one of its most salient features could arguably be instant search. WooCommerce instant search provides real-time search results, which makes the search experience faster and makes browsing a breeze for your customers.
What Is WooCommerce Instant Search?
WooCommerce instant search is a feature that allows your users to find their desired products at their fingertips within no time.
WooCommerce instant search benefits customers in a number of ways, including simplifying the search process and giving them more options to choose from. It also holds advantages for your store. For example, an effective search process causes fewer frustrations for your customers, which eventually decreases the chances of them hopping out and increases the chances of making additional sales.
Below, we discuss how WooCommerce instant search helps customers have a better browsing experience on your store.
Relevant Search Results
Every visitor to your online WooCommerce store demands relevant search results and at least 39% are influenced by relevant search results to make a purchase. WooCommerce instant search makes it easier for them to catch on to their desired products without the hassle of going through all your pages, thereby saving them time as well.
For example, if a customer is looking for medication to help with heartburn on WOWmart, they'll not only get suggestions of popular heartburn searches to try but also a list of relevant heartburn product results. This simplifies their search and spares them from manually searching through various categories.
» Learn how product search engines can help refine your search results
Personalized Search Results
WooCommerce instant search can also personalize search results based on a customer’s previous data such as search history, purchasing history, and preferences. The algorithms of instant search can track down these data points and use them to give your customers personalized shopping experiences with relevant and fast results, thereby increasing your chances of making sales.
For example, if a customer is looking for green t-shirts from Bamboo Clothing, they'll get green shirts of all styles and sizes as their result. While still relevant, these search results are not personal to the customer. If the customer is looking for short-sleeved green t-shirts for women, WooCommerce instant search can track this data and display it for the customer instead.
» Explore further how personalization can help your e-commerce business
Autocomplete and Autosuggest Functionality
Autocomplete and autosuggest are two key features of instant search.
Autocomplete allows users to complete their search query based on the letters they've already typed. Autosuggest provides suggestions regarding a user’s query as they type.
Both of these features are generated according to your database of customers and provide fast and accurate results so your customer can quickly reach their desired product. This not only reduces your customers' frustration but also maximizes product discovery and eventually results in more sales—up to 24%.
For example, a customer is looking for a gift basket on Gourmet Basket. They're unsure what exactly they're looking for, but know they want the gift basket to contain wine. Gourmet Basket's instant search automatically provides category and product suggestions for the customer to consider.
Synonym Functionality
Synonym functionality works by understanding your customers' intent when they type a query to display relevant results. This is based on natural language processing and natural language search that uses your customers' way of communicating and their context to match them to products.
For example, if a customer searches for “protective muffs” on BC Fasteners and Tools, the algorithm understands the search intent and still displays relevant search results even though the search query doesn't match the store's wording or product names exactly (e.g., "ear protection" or "ear muffs").
» Discover more tips on synonyms to drive your store forward
Take the Fast Way
In a nutshell, WooCommerce instant search is one of the most important aspects behind the success of a WooCommerce online store. Instant search possesses the power to convert users into buyers and uplift your sales, which is why it shouldn't be neglected.
This feature can also be coupled with other search functionalities like federated search to give your customers an elevated and even more refined shopping experience.
Search & discoveryHow to Use Shopify Instant Search to Maximize Product DiscoveryShopify has become a go-to solution for millions of merchants looking to sell their products online. In most cases, the success of your Shopify store depends on how well you can maximize your product discovery. Shopify instant search can help boost your product discoverability by guiding your customers to their desired products in the quickest and most efficient way possible.
What Is Shopify Instant Search?
Shopify instant search scans your store's product listings and provides relevant results in real-time as your customers type in their search queries.
This gives your customers more options to choose from, and also makes it easier for them to find what they're looking for. The result is a better shopping experience and increased product discoverability for the store.
Getting the most out of Shopify Instant Search requires taking a few key steps.
Use Autocomplete for Smarter & Faster Results
Autocomplete text is a helpful tool for getting better, faster e-commerce search results. With just a few keystrokes, customers can find what they're looking for without having to spell everything out. This eliminates the need for an extra step and lets customers go straight from typing their search term to a purchasable product with just one click.
Mastermind Toys uses autocomplete text to suggest products faster to their customers. For instance, if a customer types "star" into the search bar, the autocomplete pulls up results for Star Wars-related products right away and maximizes product discovery. This saves the customer time and takes them straight to their desired results.
Use NLP to Understand Your Customers' Intent
Natural language processing (NLP) is a technique that helps your search function understand human language and the context your customers are searching in. Shopify Instant Search uses NLP to extract the meaning behind a search query and look for the most relevant results in a large product dataset, thereby helping to increase product discovery.
When you understand your customers' intent, you can offer instant and relevant search results. For example, if a customer types "este luader" into Fragrance Buy's search bar, the store's natural language search functionality understands that the customer is actually looking for "Estee Lauder" and provides those results. This improves the overall shopping experience and increases the chances of a successful transaction.
Personalized Product Discovery
Shopify instant search can also boost personalization for product discovery by using data about your customers' behavior and preferences. This may include keeping track of the products your customers have viewed in the past and using that information to suggest similar products in future searches. By using data from personas and product rating systems, instant searches can make customers' discovery experience even more tailored and efficient.
Here are a few potential outcomes of this:
Your customers are more likely to buy products that match their interests and needs.Your customers are more likely to make repeat purchases because your store caters to their preferences.Your store maximizes product discovery and increases your chances of making a sale.
For example, if a new customer searches for a "white dress" in Princess Polly's search bar, they'll see the standard collection as a result with related (but general) search prompts on the side.
But as the customer browses the white dresses in the collection, particularly the mini dresses, the store's Shopify instant search is noting the customer's preferences and interests. So, the next time the customer visits the store, their experience is already more personalized with suggestions for mini dresses and white dresses before even starting their search.
» Dive deeper into the personalization experience here
Why Shopify Stores Invest in Instant Search
Smart Shopify merchants understand that their store's search can make or break their customer experience. With the help of its features, you can:
Convert more leads into customers
Instant search makes it easier for your shoppers to quickly find the right product without the hassle of navigating through multiple pages. This significantly increases their odds of purchasing.Improve customer satisfaction and loyalty
An effective instant search solution gathers valuable information about your customers' searches and interactions on your site. You can analyze this data to gain insight into customers' intent so you can show results that enhance their satisfaction and loyalty.Increase sales
Mobile instant search reduces the need for extensive site exploration, shortening the path to purchase and increasing the likelihood of buying and spending more. Shoppers who use search spend 2.6 times more on average than those who don't.
Do It the Fast Way
The e-commerce industry is highly competitive and with so many choices, customers expect a certain experience when they shop online. With Shopify instant search, you can give your customers a personal shopping journey that effortlessly leads them to the products they're looking for, thereby increasing your conversions and customer retention.
Search & discoveryShopify Predictive Search: The Complete GuideShopify is a leading e-commerce platform with over 4.4 million online stores using its services to sell their products to customers. Apart from its key features like custom designs and secure hosting, it also offers a predictive text feature to make it easier for your customers to search for products on your store.
Shopify's predictive search feature suggests search results to your customers in real time as they type their query.
This enhances your customers' search experience and can result in high conversion rates. Plus, predictive search can also help you understand your customers' buyer persona and inform future improvements to your store.
As an industry, e-commerce is rapidly growing and constantly evolving, driven by technological advancements and changing consumer behavior. So, e-commerce sellers are looking for tools like Shopify predictive search that can help them keep up.
What Is Shopify Predictive Search?
Shopify predictive search uses algorithms to analyze your customers' behavior and gives them suggestions as they type a query into the search bar. This way your customers quickly find the products they're looking for without writing the whole query and going through different pages of search results.
The results from predictive search can include different elements:
A simple list of text suggestionsProduct images and namesCategories or collectionsPopular or trending search terms
For example, Princess Polly, an online fashion boutique, gives its customers product suggestions, collection suggestions, and trending searches based on other customers' activities.
How Predictive Search Helps Shopify Stores
Shopify predictive search is a powerful tool that can benefit both you and your customers.
1. Improved Customer Experience
Shopify predictive search offers your customers a quick and easy searching experience, which is far removed from traditional searches and helps to reduce their frustrations if they find it hard to navigate to the product they want.
For example, predictive search can remove certain language issues. It reduces spelling mistakes because your customers don't have to type out their entire query. And if you use synonyms in your site search, then predictive search can make complimentary suggestions if your customers' search terms are different from the terms on your store.
» Discover more tips on using spelling and synonyms to your advantage
2. Higher Conversion Rate
Shopify predictive search makes your products more discoverable. By automatically completing your customers' search query, your conversions can increase by 24%.
Also, since 39% of online shoppers are influenced by a relevant search, you have good opportunities to upsell and cross-sell. By making suggestions to your customers, they may come across products they didn't know you had or thought they needed.
The convenience of instant and relevant search results can not only improve conversion rates but customer retention as well because customers are more likely to return to your store if it offers better experiences.
» Explore these additional benefits of upselling and cross-selling
3. Better Customer Service
You can use the data that Shopify predictive search gathers about your customers' behavior to give them a better experience every time they visit your store.
By personalizing their shopping journey, your customers effortlessly find what they're looking for, which in turn can solidify their trust in and loyalty to your brand and products — by up to 49%.
» Delve into the details of personalization here
4. Greater Competitive Advantage
If up to 61% of e-commerce sites deliver disappointing search results, then Shopify predictive search can set you apart from your competitors.
Analyzing the data from your predictive search can not only help to give your customers a positive experience that they associate with your store, but you can also adjust and improve your business strategy, product offerings, pricing, promotions, and marketing to maximize sales and average order value.
» Learn how predictive analytics can help your e-commerce store
How to Set Up Shopify Predictive Search
You might be thinking setting up Shopify predictive search is a lengthy and difficult process, but it’s actually not that complex and can be done quite easily.
Start by installing a search app from the Shopify App Store.
Once installed, you have to give the app access to your store and product pages so it can start indexing.Once complete, predictive search is enabled for your store. Your customers will be able to use the feature right away.
What to Keep in Mind
As with any app or software, Shopify predictive search can only give you promising results if it's installed and used properly. Consider these tips to make sure your predictive search feature is optimized.
Monitor Your Website Speed
Predictive search apps are full of resources and data points, so they can consume a high amount of server data and slow your website down. This is because predictive search adds an extra layer of complexity to provide real-time suggestions and predictions for your customers.
Tip: Upgrade your website's hosting or optimize the app’s algorithms to keep your website's performance at its best.
Ensure Proper Configuration For the Best Search Results
If your predictive search app is not configured correctly, it can give inaccurate results when your customers do a search on your store. This can be because there is not enough data for the app to work with or its settings aren't properly activated.
Tip: Monitor the backend of your search app to make sure its settings are correct and to increase the data quality and volume if necessary.
Make Sure You Stay in the Fast Lane
The success of any e-commerce store lies in selling its products to its customers — but only if those customers can find your products. Shopify predictive search can give your customers a seamless shopping experience with instant and accurate search results. Your customers only have to give a prompt, therefore saving time and perhaps finding something they didn't expect.
Search & discoveryFederated Search Engine: Show Accurate Results From Multiple SourcesImproving your overall customer experience is essential to running your e-commerce store. And if you want to level up, make sure you have a federated search engine on your site that shows your customers accurate results.
Suppose you have a significant social media presence or run offline ads. When people come to your site after seeing a product they love, they aren't going to scroll endlessly through your products to find it — they'll head to the search bar first. Therefore, you want to be sure your e-commerce store has an effective search engine that delivers the best results and experience.
This is where a federated search engine comes into the picture.
What Is a Federated Search Engine?
A federated search engine is a search tool that scours multiple sources of information and presents its findings as a single, unified result.
Using this type of search engine is becoming increasingly popular among e-commerce managers. It provides customers with a better search experience by showing them results from different places, including product catalogs, customer reviews, blog posts, and subscriptions.
» Discover the differences between e-commerce and content search
How Does Federated Search Help Your Store?
Federated search helps your store deliver better customer experiences, improves reliability, and helps shoppers find more relevant search results.
Better Customer Experience
By providing a unified search experience, a federated search engine helps to improve your customers' shopping experience on your store. Your customers can search for products, content, and other information from one place, saving them time and effort since they don't have to navigate to different parts of the store to find what they're looking for. Plus, your customers may find products they didn't know you had, giving you a great opportunity to upsell and cross-sell.
For example, consider Targus's search results feature content from collections, products, popular searches, and articles, giving their customers a flexible shopping experience.
Increased Reliability
A federated search engine can also increase the reliability of your store's search results. By searching multiple sources, a federated search can deliver more accurate results because it finds relevant information in places that it wouldn't be able to with a siloed search engine.
More Relevant Search Results
A federated search engine can also deliver more relevant search results based on past customer behavior or by searching various sites. For example, a customer might be searching for a product that's no longer in stock, but a federated search engine could find that product in another store and deliver a result to the customer.
Let's take a look at an example. Urban Clothing has many different brands, and you can get results across all brands when shopping for something specific, like bodysuits. If this feature didn't exist, shoppers would have to search five different sites to find what they're looking for.
Easier To Browse
With a traditional search engine, customers might have to navigate to different parts of your store to find what they're looking for. For example, they might have to navigate to your blog to find styling tips for spring and then go to your maxi dress collection to find the perfect floral print. With a federated search engine, customers can search for products, content, and other information from one place. This saves them time and effort and makes it easier to find what they're looking for — and buy!
Take the Fast Way
A federated search engine is a must-have tool for any e-commerce store. By delivering better customer experiences, increased reliability, and more relevant search results, a federated search engine helps your store to stand out from the crowd. A good federated search engine will help you provide a better search experience for your customers and help to keep them coming back for more. So, why wait? Take the fast way and give your store the search engine it deserves.