A BLOG FOR E-COMMERCE LEADERS

SLI Blog

Posts with site search Tag

SLI Receives Magento Partner Award and Other 2015 Accolades

Posted by Eileen ElameCommerce, Press, Site Search, Success Stories

SLI Receives Magento’s Highest Partner Honor

Last week at Magento Imagine, SLI received the “2015 Magento Technology Partner Spirit of Excellence Award for North America.” The annual award recognizes partners who have delivered exemplary service to Magento clients. Evaluations are made across a number of critical elements such as commitment to quality deployments, merchant satisfaction, growth, penetration in emerging markets, innovation and strategic planning.

Magento is the provider of the world’s fastest growing e-commerce platform. We are thrilled to partner with them in providing SLI Learning Search Connect™ as an easily downloadable Magento extension.

Magento Spirit of ExcellenceRetail Innovator 2015

Also in 2015, SLI has received other distinctions stemming from the company’s dedication to achieving high ROI for its customers and its commitment to exemplary service for its partners. This follows a record year of awards for SLI, which received a total of 10 awards in 2014 for technology, customer-use scenarios, and customer support. We are proud to acknowledge these accolades for 2015 (and it’s only April!).

SLI Customer Wine Enthusiast Receives Retail TouchPoints 2015 Retail Innovator Award

Wine Enthusiast’s CMO Glenn Edelman was named a winner of Retail TouchPoints 2015 Retail Innovator Award. Wine Enthusiast uses SLI Dynamic Product Banners™, which automatically displays banners with items related to a visitor’s original web search on product pages. Edelman will be recognized at the Retail Innovation Conference, June 16-17 in New York City.

“With SLI Dynamic Product Banners, visitors are more prone to stay and buy from our site rather than clicking back to Google where they could end up on a competitor’s site,” said Edelman. “In fact, when visitors interact with the banners, we see a 48% increase in revenue-per-click and a 14% increase in conversion rates. The banners also have a real impact on lowering bounce rate from the site’s landing pages.”

Read more about their success in our Wine Enthusiast case study.

SLI Customer Lakeshore Learning Recognized by eTail West for Search Excellence’

Lakeshore Learning, supplier of school supplies for preschools and elementary classrooms, was named a 2015 finalist in eTail West’s Best-in-Class Awards for ‘Search’ innovation and excellence. By implementing a rich set of features and refinements by SLI, Lakeshore Learning has been able to improve its site’s customer experience and offer personalized products relevant to shoppers.

As discussed in our Lakeshore Learning case study, the company used SLI Learning Search™ and SLI Site Champion™ to make even more of its content easy to find.

“Multi-faceted search allows customers to quickly narrow down hundreds of products and still maintain a clean and robust search experience,” said Sam Sarullo, VP of E-commerce at Lakeshore Learning. “Personalizing the site to draw people into areas most helpful for them has been a big improvement. Since implementing Learning Search™ we have seen double-digit online revenue growth, while average order values went up 30 percent and conversion rates rose nearly 19 percent.”

Site Champion™ dynamically creates SEO landing pages based on actual user searches that are indexed by Google and other Internet search engines. Lakeshore Learning has seen a return of $127 for every $1 spent on SLI Site Champion.

To learn more about how SLI provides award-winning results for customers like Harry & David and Sports Authority, check out more of our case studies and video testimonials.

Back-To-School Shoppers Search for Charts, Magnets and… Common Core?

Posted by Eileen ElameCommerce

Nothing softens the summer’s end and back-to-school blues like a little retail therapy. According to eMarketer, online shoppers spent more than $50 billion during the 2014 back-to-school shopping season, which represents a 16% gain from $43.3 billion in 2013. Sixteen percent!

A key aspect of the back-to-school shopping blitz is of course school supply shopping – and purchasing materials online is becoming more and more convenient for time-strapped families and teachers.

To uncover the most highly sought after school supplies driving unprecedented online sales for the 2014-2015 school year, SLI’s data team analyzed more than 33 million searches conducted between June 1 and August 22, 2014. We looked at three popular U.S. online retailers selling office and school supplies, including instructional materials. These e-commerce retailers are SLI customers that use our site search software to ensure thousands of products are easy for educators, parents, and office managers alike, to find and purchase.

Our analysis revealed that teachers and parents were busy readying classrooms, supply kits, and bookshelves with a variety of materials, from charts to stickers. The most popular items searched for were “chart pocket” at 96,000+ searches, “magnet” with 88,800+ searches, and “calendar” with close to 76,000 searches. Trailing down the top 20 list, we saw that “pencils” garnered 40,800 searches and “Dr. Seuss” more than 32,000.

Common Core Materials

A not too surprising discovery among the site search data analyses was the volume of interest around the term “Common Core,” indicating that many teachers – and possibly parents as well – searched for materials related to the mandated, yet controversial standard.

The Common Core State Standards Initiative is an educational initiative in the U.S., currently adopted by 44 of the 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia, that details what students in K-12 grades should know in English, history, social studies, science and mathematics at the end of each grade. It seeks to establish consistent educational standards across the states and ensure that students graduating from high school are prepared to enter college programs or the workforce.

Our data analysis revealed that during the back-to-school season, there were more than 72,000 searches for “Common Core.” Digging deeper into the numbers, we found:

  • Top Five States – Site searches originated most from CA (with nearly 3x that of the next state), followed by NY, IL, and FL with between 4,200 to nearly 5,000 searches each, and then GA with 3,000+ searches.
  • Top Five Grades – While 75% of the searches conducted for “Common Core” did not include a specific grade, “Common Core + 2nd grade” garnered the most interest with 4,500+ searches, followed by 3rd, 4th and 5th grades, which averaged 3,300 searches each. First grade saw just shy of 2,000 searches.

A value add of SLI is that we provide online retail retailers with insight regarding the products consumers are seeking. Accordingly, vendors know which products to stock and can promote those items consumers are most likely to buy. And through our easy-to-use search, consumers can readily find the merchandise they desire and get recommendations on related products that they may have overlooked, leading to a truly rewarding shopping experience.

Visit our library of best-practice case studies to see how SLI helps leading e-commerce retailers accelerate sales by connecting shoppers with the products they’re most likely to buy.

Find Your Way Out of Any Paper Jam with This Online Store

Posted by Dawn MortensenConferences, eCommerce, Navigation, Site Search, Success Stories1 comment

This is third in a series of success stories on eCommerce sites that are growing their business with advanced site search. Also in this series, read about Party Supplies Delivered and Vermont Teddy Bear, and see live presentations of these stories at the SLI Theater at IRCE June 3-6.

Jam Paper & Envelope, a top source for paper crafts, creative giftwrap and all other things paper-related, has been featured in Real Simple, Martha Stewart Living and Country Living Magazine, among others. With its flagship New York City store, a successful online retail operation, and two other store locations, the paper company has been able to succeed both in the brick-and-mortar and eCommerce worlds.

JamPaper.com offers more than a million variations of specialty envelopes, paper, cardstock, gift cards and other paper goods, with 70% of its sales going to businesses that place large orders for marketing promotions, weddings or other events. The business started two generations ago and has remained in the family, with grandson Andrew Jacobs leading the effort to create the eCommerce site. Jam Paper first went online in 2004 and the site traffic is growing steadily.

“Our initial site search was rudimentary,” Jacobs said. “But since we’ve started online we’ve been constantly working on improving.”

One of the challenges for JamPaper.com was to help their users find the exact product they wanted among the enormous number of items and pages. Envelopes, for example, are one of their most common searches, but envelopes can come in 50 colors and 50 sizes – with many small variations for each. Since they improved their site search and navigation, Jam Paper has made the following improvements so users can more easily find and purchase the exact product(s) they want:

  • Made site search results more relevant and incorporated sales data into search results tuning so the most popular items come up higher in results.
  • Added synonym suggestions to improve the results on search terms that previously turned up with poor results.
  • Incorporated Rich Auto Complete to auto-populate suggestions based on popular search terms and take users directly to the product page.
  • Analyzed and restructured data internally to improve search results.
  • Added merchandising banners to search results pages.
  • Used A/B testing to identify additional improvements that will increase conversions.

By analyzing their search data on an ongoing basis, Jam Paper continuously improves their online user experience. The impact on online sales is “crawling upwards and keeps getting better,” Jacobs said.

At IRCE in Chicago June 4 and 5, Andrew Jacobs will be at the SLI Theater to share the tips and tricks he’s learned for improving Jam Paper’s eCommerce site search, navigation and SEO. Stop by Booth #501 to meet him or to get a free site critique from the SLI Systems team.

Other SLI Theater presenters include Steiner Tractor, Envelopes.com, Samuels Jewelers and ReNew Life. See the full schedule of presentations here.

A Beary Good Success Story: Vermont Teddy Bear

Posted by Dawn MortensenConferences, eCommerce, Navigation, Site Search, Success Stories

This is second in a series of success stories on eCommerce sites that are growing their business with advanced site search. See live presentations of these stories at the SLI Theater at IRCE June 3-6.

Ever heard of a Bear-Gram®? How about a Pajama-Gram®? The same company that sends both types of cuddly gifts to more than 150,000 customers each year is Vermont Teddy Bear. As an 11-time Platinum Honoree in BizRate.com’s Circle of Excellence awards, Vermont Teddy Bear is among the world’s best online stores in Ease of Ordering, On-Time Delivery, Product Selection, Customer Support, Repurchase Intent and Overall Satisfaction, according to millions of BizRate customers.

Since 1981, Vermont Teddy Bear has offered high-quality, U.S.-made bears in the style of the original Teddy Roosevelt Bear from 1902. The bears can be personalized and are delivered overnight in a special box complete with air hole, game and candy treat (in case the bear gets bored or hungry on the way to its new owner, says the company).

As the word about Vermont Teddy Bear’s BearGrams first spread through radio ads in the ‘80s, the company expanded to include PajamaGram, which delivers gifts of cozy, quality pajamas, as well as CalyxFlowers, which delivers bouquets and other floral gifts from growers around the world. The sister companies have operated successful online retail operations for well over a decade.

Partnering to Increase Online Sales

Vermont Teddy Bear has its own team of eCommerce experts who work with partners to optimize their online reach. Since early 2008, Vermont Teddy Bear has used SLI Systems to improve the brand’s site search, navigation, mobile commerce and search engine rankings. At PajamaGram.com, SLI Learning Search ensures that the most popular products – as well as those the company specifically wants to promote, like their family set pajamas – are those first displayed in relevant search results. SLI Learning Navigation pages also make it easy for visitors to shop for pajama gifts by size. The result? More families and gift-givers finding matching pajama sets in the right size.

Vermont Teddy Bear’s Director of eCommerce Operations, Victor Castro, will showcase the business’ online successes at the SLI Theater, booth #501, during the Internet Retailer Conference and Exhibition (IRCE) in Chicago June 3-6, 2013. See our full lineup of scheduled feature presentations, or just stop by at 3:30 on June 5 or 6 to see Victor. Wearing your pajamas is optional!

Reason to Party: 203% More Conversions

Posted by Dawn MortensenConferences, eCommerce, Navigation, Search Conferences, SEO, Site Search

This is first in a series of success stories on eCommerce sites that are growing their business with advanced site search. See live presentations of these stories at the SLI Theater at IRCE June 4-6.

Every eTailer knows this: You can’t get people to buy what they can’t find.

In the online party supply world, for example, a consumer has dozens of choices for where to buy a $250 life-sized Dr. Who TARDIS. If your site doesn’t appear high in Google results for this item – or if your customers can’t find the science fiction party supplies on your site – then your conversion rates will be as unpredictable as is the TARDIS’ ability for accurate time travel.

PartySuppliesDelivered.com is one among dozens of online party supply stores. With more than 4,000 products and the backing of parent company Mattress USA, PartySuppliesDelivered.com had a couple great things going for it. But there was one major problem: Customers could not find what they were looking for.

The party supplier’s original site search technology was the default search included with its eCommerce platform. It ranked search results only by the number of times the search term was found in the description, instead of ranking search results by relevance. This limited approach led to skewed results and frustrated potential customers.

To solve this problem, Party Supplies Delivered put its search function and site navigation into the full-service care of SLI Systems. As customers began to find more relevant results for their searches, the business improvements were remarkable; the bounce rate dropped 40 percent, page views increased by 132 percent and conversions went up by 203 percent. Key features like focused category pages, rich auto-complete and user-generated SEO are among the changes that are turning the business around.

“Now when customers drill into a subcategory, they really browse around; pages per visit are up 111 percent. This increases their average order too,” said Ian MacDonald, VP of eCommerce & Marketing for Party Supplies Delivered.

To learn more about how advanced site search and navigation technology helps Party Supplies Delivered, read their case study. If you’re coming to IRCE, stop by the SLI Theater at booth #501, where you can see a live demo from our customers including Ian from Party Supplies Delivered – plus get a free site critique. We look forward to seeing you there!

eCommerce Merchandising Made Easy

Posted by Kemberly GongeCommerce, Merchandising, Site Search

In contrast to the brick and mortar stores where we all grew up shopping, online shopping offers a variety of ways to put the right items in front of your customers. Instead of sorting through racks or shelves of products that we don’t want in order to find the few items we do want, merchandising on an eCommerce site allows you to easily put front and center the items your customers want most.

Like a personal shopper, let your customers lead you to their favorite items and then suggest other similar pieces, tell them about special promotions and don’t lead them away from their desired item. With successful eCommerce merchandising, you can automate these various incentives to drive your customers to the shopping cart.

Here are a couple tips to improve your merchandising; you’ll find the complete list and more in our Big Book of Site Search Tips. Download it today to learn the most innovative, yet practical ways to improve your site’s usability.

1. Override Search Results

Online shoppers pay the most attention to the first several results “above the fold”, or rather, what is shown initially on screen without scrolling. If you have relevant promotional, sale or seasonal items you’d like to showcase, you might consider overriding search results to place them at the top of the list.

2. Don’t Present Unrelated Cross-sell or Up-sell Products

When your customer enters a search term, it’s a clear signal about what they are looking to find. Keep the products that you recommend focused on the initial search keyword. Shoppers will distrust the value of your search function if it habitually returns irrelevant promotional results.

3. Show Search Results on Product Pages

When someone searches a specific keyword on the web and clicks an organic listing that leads to one of your product detail pages, you can increase conversions and reduce bounce rates of those visits by including other search results for that  keyword. In our Big Book of Site Search Tips, we show an example  from Motorcycle Superstore.

For instance, if a customer searches Google for “Bell Helmet Rally” and clicks a link to Motorcycle Superstore’s detail page they’ll see a banner on the page containing other Bell motorcycle helmets. This surfaces a broader range of products than they would have otherwise seen, which is useful if the original product is out of stock or is not a best seller.

These are just a few tips for increasing clicks and reducing bounce rates on your eCommerce site with effective merchandising. You’ll find even more strategies in our Big Book of Site Search Tips. It’s full of useful guidelines to help make site-wide enhancements on your eCommerce site to create an intuitive site that leads customers to the most relevant and popular items they desire.

 

Load More