New Download: E-commerce Site Search Platforms: What's The Difference?

Our new cheat sheet is ideal for retailers who are deciding between e-commerce site search solutions. With so many platforms out there, it can be hard to choose the right one for your company. Our guide highlights and compares key features from Loop54, Endeca, BloomReach and Algolia. 

The Importance of Site Search

Today's shoppers are reliant on site search to find the information and products they want. This means that picking the right site search platform is a vital first step for any e-commerce business - particularly those with large product catalogues.

An ineffective site search platform can directly affect your bottom line. Inaccurate search results inevitably lead to frustration with your platform and your customers shopping elsewhere. Shoppers who receive zero site search results are three times more likely to leave (Wired).  

The Key Site Search Features

When deciding which site search platform is right for you, there are there are three things you should consider. Firstly, how much manual intervention does it require? Some platforms rely on constant manual intervention to keep the site search up to date with customer demands. Other platforms are able to automate this process, freeing up time and resources.

Secondly, you should consider how well the prospective platform is able to leverage your data to deliver relevant search results. Some platforms, like Loop54, can leverage the data you already have (i.e. your product catalogue data) to build initial relevancy and continuously optimize using real-time behaviour data, while others require constant manual input.

Finally, you should think about how you want your site search to process language. Each site search platform offers its own set of features to understand language. This can range from Natural Language Processing, to synonym dictionaries, to character normalisation and spellcheck. It's important you find a platform that can understand your customers and serve them the results they want.  

Our Cheat Sheet Assesses the Following Factors: 

• Data Leverage
• Business User Control
• Data / Index Management Features
• Understanding Customers
• Total Cost of Ownership
• Personalisation
• Flexibility
• Ease of Search Tuning
• Data Consumption
• Multilingual and Multi-Site Features
• Support
• Hardware Footprint

Compare the pros and cons of the leading site search platforms — download our cheat sheet.