Does your site search need a makeover?
Lately, a lot has been written on internal search – why to track it, KPIs to measure it, and its role in conversion. But before you even delve into these issues, you’d better take a look at your search page’s ‘personality’. Why? Site search is like a shop counter or reception desk. So it’s crucial that the search function reflects and reinforces your customer service standards.
In our experience, unfortunately, site search engines often let the team down. Instead of being governed by the company’s customer service policy, many site search engines exhibit incompatible personality traits and behaviours, because of the way it has been configured and designed (or implemented on the default settings). While some site search pages are friendly and informative, with navigatable results, too often we find they are:
- Unhelpful (returning unrelated results)
- Uncaring (no results found)
- Out on an extended lunch break (search function coming soon).
In the offline world, would we continue to employ a customer service staff member who exhibited these negative behaviours? No!
Yet a number of companies are keeping this very active staff member (aka the underperforming search engine) on the payroll and, worse, doing nothing to monitor or optimise it.
Identify your search engine’s personality
Role play your search process out loud with your team. Have a team member play the role of the customer visiting your site (use your internal search keyword reports for inspiration) and another member entering the request into the search engine and verbally communicating the results.
It is important not to add any further information to the interaction except for the results the search engine provides. Also, don’t offer further assistance or prompting unless the search engine offers it. At each “show-stopper” event – such as no result, non-targeted results, or a broken link (to name a few) – yell at the top of your voice, “Next customer please!”
Write down words that describe the interaction and the number of customers you sent away, if any.
So, is your search engine with or against you?
Identify your desired search engine behaviours
Now, would you respond to the customer the same way offline and/or if you were following your customer service standards?
For example, on a hot day, a customer walks into your store and asks for ice-cream, but you don’t carry ice-creams. How would you respond to this enquiry? Would you tell the customer that “no results were found”? A more helpful response would be “Sorry, we don’t sell ice-creams.” If you are an astute and caring business person, you would also add, “but we do have fresh frozen yoghurt bars that are very popular on hot days.” What are the chances of the customer buying frozen yoghurt? Some – probably better than the chance of them walking out empty handed.
Is there a match between the real and desired performance of your search engine? If so, congratulations! If not, your search engine is need of a personality makeover.
Using your customer service standards as a guide, configure your hardest-working member of the customer service team (who else will work 24/7?). Soon your site search engine will be serving customers in line with the customer service qualities your company admires.
For further information, download Search Analytics: A Guide to Analyzing and Optimizing Website Search Engines.