Ever heard of the Pareto Principle?
In short, it states that 80% of your results come from 20% of your efforts. On-site search is one of those areas where a small number of customers are the reason for a BIG chunk of your business. Specifically, only 10% of your customers are using search on your site, but they generate 50% of your revenue. These smart searchers are also 5x more likely to make a purchase than non-searchers. How can you optimise the way your on-site search works and take full advantage of this?
The Why
Intent Signalling
Sometimes it’s hard to know what a website visitor wants. If you’re reading this blog about on-site search, then your next click takes you to our Careers page, then you jump to our SMS marketing solution, you’re sending very mixed signals! You might be in the market for our entire suite of tools, you might be a competitor doing research, or you might be working on a marketing degree and learning about the tech landscape for general purposes.
However, if you search our site for resources on GDPR, your intentions are much clearer.
Keyword Goldmine
A key part of SEO and PPC success is understanding what exact terms your audience use to talk about your product. On-site search is a goldmine for this; combine the search terms with actual purchases and you’ll see exactly what to put in your next advert or blog post.
The How
Big Ole’ Box
It sounds basic, but make sure your search bar is obvious! If its getting lost in your main menu, or tucked away at the bottom of your homepage, those power customers who are coming to your site to begin their search can’t do so, and you wont earn their trust or their money.
Tolerance for typos
A deacon, an imam and a rabbit walk into a bar. The rabbit says “I think I’m a typo.”
If you’re a clothing retailer, and a customer in a hurry types in “mens skinny deans”, it’s obvious to a human that they’ve made a typo. But is it obvious to your on-site search? A decent list of common misspellings of your products will keep your customers on track.
Amazing Auto-complete
Having on-site search rather than expecting a potential customer to click their way through every page on your site is an exercise in making their buying journey easier. You can take this a step further with autocomplete.
To continue our previous example, if your clothing customer types in “mens je”, then auto-completing to “mens jeans” is a pretty safe bet. It may only save the customer a few seconds, but that could make the difference between a sale and a bounce!
Strong Suggestions
“If I’d asked people what they wanted, they would have said ‘a faster horse’” – Henry Ford
On-site search is great on its own but combining it with customer profiling takes its potential to another level entirely.
Our clothing retailer has plenty of data in their CRM that shows people who are buying jeans will frequently buy a new sweater to go with it, to create a casual outfit for cool weather. So, showing this sweater to jeans buyers (and vice versa) could easily double the value of a single transaction.
Ready to optimise your on-site search?
Spotler Activate Search puts the power in your hands to create a fully optimised onsite search. Book yourself a demo and see how you can boost your revenue!
