SLI Systems Blog

Interviews with PC Universe and DMV

shaunr — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 04:30:10 +0000

We’ve recently posted two more interviews on the Ecommerce Podcast site: One with Patrick Colletta of PC Universe and one with Raj Lahoti of Online Guru.

PC Universe are an online store with a large catalog (tens of thousands of products). This brings their own set of challenges. Patrick gives us a background on the company, the technologies they’re using and talks about the difficulties of maintaining accurate product descriptions for tens of thousands of products.

Online Guru’s main site is DMV.org - the unofficial guide to the DMV. In the interview with Rajhe talks about how he started the company with his brother and how they’ve grown it to be one of the most popular sites in the US. It’s a fascinating story of a young entrepreneur who has a wealth of opportunities ahead of him.

ExactTarget’s Route 1 to 1 seminar visits Miami and Boston

geoffb — Sat, 19 Jul 2008 09:26:01 +0000

This week SLI Systems will be visiting Miami, FL and Boston, MA as the last two cities in the ExactTarget Route 1 to 1 seminar series.

For more information on this event and to register visit the Route 1 to 1 site.

Central Vacuum cleans up their search

shaunr — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 20:06:20 +0000

I spotted a new customer of ours, Central Vacuum Stores, blogging about their powerful new search. I’m always pleased to see a happy customer.

June Newsletter - New Tools for Faster, User-Friendly Search

geoffb — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 04:50:44 +0000

Our June newsletter contains details on some of our recent product enhancements that you may find useful. Recent product improvements include the release of our Auto Complete feature (read the blog post The benefits of Auto Complete for more information), our redesigned merchandising console, and improvements to the speed of our core search technology.

For more information read our site search newsletter.

The benefits of Auto Complete

blairc — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 00:30:10 +0000

We recently released an autocomplete feature that’s been picked up by many of our clients. This uses previous user’s searches (in aggregate) to automatically create keyword suggestions, which are then displayed in order of popularity. It is really fast too. Head over to cableorganizer.com if you want to see it in action.

Prior to the release we had trouble estimating how often people would use it. We couldn’t find any usage stats out there we could use as a baseline. While it is still early days, it is currently being used 20% of the time, and on average people are saving themselves from typing about eight characters each time. Saving a few keystrokes is great, but the real benefit appears to be helping people use search terms that are hard to spell – spelling suggestions are required much less often on sites with this technology. This means more people are finding what they want the first time, which has to be a good thing.

New Zealand Retailers Association eCommerce Seminar Series

geoffb — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 05:39:31 +0000

This week SLI is exhibiting at the New Zealand Retailers Association eCommerce Seminar Series being held in Christchurch on July 2nd and Auckland on July 3rd.

ExactTarget’s Route 1 to 1 seminar visits Seattle and San Francisco

geoffb — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 06:26:19 +0000

This week SLI Systems will be visiting Seattle, WA and San Francisco, CA as part of the ExactTarget Route 1 to 1 seminar series.

For more information on the various cities and to register visit the Route 1 to 1 site.

And the winner is…

shaunr — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 21:55:19 +0000

We had a great time at the Internet Retailer Conference last week in Chicago. It is very stimulating talking to so many people, including online retailers, industry experts, and the other vendors. SLI sponsored the opening reception on the Monday night and we gave away a MacBook Air (from our Cupertino neighbor, Apple) - this created a lot of interest. The winner was Shirley Tan of American Bridal. Conincidentally Shirley is an existing customer of SLI Systems. She was very happy to win the laptop.

ExactTarget’s Route 1 to 1 seminar visits the OC

geoffb — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 07:12:00 +0000

This week SLI Systems will be visiting the OC, Orange Country, CA as part of the ExactTarget Route 1 to 1 seminar series.

For more information on the various cities and to register visit the Route 1 to 1 site.

Internet Retailer Conference

geoffb — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 11:32:04 +0000

Next week we’re traveling to Chicago for the Internet Retailer Conference. We’re exhibiting at booth #655 (near the front of the exhibit hall).

We’re also hosting a series of presentations with our partners - CORESense, PowerReviews, WebLinc, ExactTarget, Trinity Insight, and DMinSite will demonstrate how their leading technologies along with SLI Systems advanced site search and navigation solutions can help your ecommerce site jump to the next level.

If you would like to find out more or to request a meeting please visit our Partner Solution Zone page.