This week we return to basics with some general tips for how to improve performance of your site search. Both of the tips below are very simple to implement and can increase usage of your site’s search box, which can result in higher conversions, click-throughs and/or content downloads – which is great for lead generation. For the complete list of tips, just click here to download our “Big Book of Site Search Tips” which offers close to 80 tips for how to improve performance of your site search to help your bottom line.
While we’re on the topic of site search tips, do you have any tips you’d like to share? If so, feel free to post them here as a comment and we’ll consider adding them to our ongoing discussion.
- If you have the text “enter search here” in the search box, use JavaScript so that the term disappears as soon as people click in the box and begin typing – Avoid forcing the site visitor to delete the text prior to typing in their own search term—sometimes people start typing before deleting the text and unconsciously enter jumbled letters, causing problems for the search results they’ll see.
- Don’t confuse visitors by having the search box placed near other boxes, such as newsletter subscribe sign-up forms — Make sure the search box is distinctive and easy to find. Given that site visitors expect to find their way to the search box—and given that they may abandon your site if they can’t find the search box—it makes sense to keep the search box prominently highlighted by itself on a webpage. For example, in the newsletter-subscribe box you may want to put the text first.last@youremail.com, which indicates that this box is expecting an email address, not a search term.
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