Magento Search Form Optimisation
Following my recent post about the custom search form I developed for a client, I think it’s important for any ecommerce website to maximise the quality and usability of its search feature. Whenever I go on an ecommerce website, to be honest, I will use the search form. Every time. If only I could apply a similar method in real life to shops like The House of Fraser!
The advanced search form is a nice tool which I think belongs on its page as an alternative to the basic search, not brought out on the homepage as I have talked about before. The advanced search form should be just there as an alternative – the basic search form is the one people should be using. This is the one that scans product attributes for keywords, and of done properly will return the most accurate results.
Where Should It Go?
I’m gonna start with basic stuff, a search form should be clear, simple to use, reasonably wide (at least 70 characters I think) and located above the fold of the page. A user will always look high up the page for the search form, so don’t hide it in a sidebar or within the content – make it stand out. This tool allows customers to find what they want straight away – tell them that. I’d also recommend removing any pre-filled text. Those of you that use istockphoto will know how annoying that can be. The on below was located top-centre of the webpage:
Product Attribute Configuration
The attributes you apply to all of your products are vital to having a successful search form. You can configure whether they are looked up by the search form or not by going into Catalog > Attributes > Manage Attributes. Click on the attribute you want to enable the search for and make sure that ‘Use in quick search’ is set to ‘Yes’. You don’t want everything enabled in the quick search though, for example the product description. A product description may mention other products, other colours or anything. This can distort the search results, so stick to things that you have the most control over. Here’s my advice:
- Product Name – obviously!
- Attributes such as Colour, Manufacturer, Size & Product Type
- SKU – some people know product codes
- Possibly the Short Description is used wisely
If I was selling a pair of white Nike trainers I would have this kind of search data:
- Name: Nike Air MaxTrainers
- Colour: White
- Manufacturer: Nike
- Sizes: 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12
- Type: Trainers
- SKU: NK12345
If I now came to this site, I could quite easily find what I was looking for because this product would have been made completely searchable by how I set its attributes.
Search Form Settings
The search form can be configured in System > Configuration > Catalog > Catalog Search. I would suggest using ‘Fulltext’ as this offers the best search result performance (the same as MySQL fulltext searching). After enabling this, ensure search indexes are up to date by going to System > Index Management and re-indexing all the data.
Google Analytics Site Search
One last thing which is a nice feature for those who use Ecomerce Analytics is entering parameters for Site Search. Magento uses ‘q’ for all of it’s basic search form search queries, so while you’re enabling this be sure to enter this in. It gives you extra information about how your shop searches are performing – including how many of these searches lead to sales. This will tell you what’s worth searching for, and therefore what you should optimise your products for.
My final words in this lengthy blog post are simple. Make the most of your Magento search form because its the greatest tool your users have at their disposal when they shop on your site. Magento to their credit have given us a comprehensive, consise and very customisable search function – so don’t let it go to waste! Thanks for reading the Magento Blog at Ecommerce Web Design.
