Sprell.no - Enterprise Search in E-commerce - Findability Day 2014

Findability  day Copenhagen  11.  September  2014  

This  is  the  story  about  Sprell’s  investment  in  search   •  Its  not  technically  advanced •  Its  not  big  in  terms  of  users •  Its  not  ground  breaking  in  its  consept…

…But  it  is  case  where  the  effects  of  improved  search  has  been  quanBfied

Sprell  is  a  small  family  business  selling  quality  toys  offline  and  online  to  Norwegian

19  years    -­‐    7  shops    -­‐    online  sales  since  2000    -­‐    leading  in  our  niche    -­‐    double  digit  growth  –  6M  Euro  2013  –  target  10M  Euro  in  2016

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We  sell  «the  good  stuff»  to  parents  who  care

Toys  that  work            

Healthy  materials  that  last            

Toys  with  a  pedagogical  content    

Get  closer  to  the  customer  

User  Experience  revisited  

Search  Mobile  MulHchannel  retail  

Understand  how  to  market  online  

Learn  online    markeHng  

Understand  what  is  important  for  us  

Explore  Social  Media  

AdverHse  wisely  

Mail   Take  care  of  our  brand  and  be  relevant  

Get  up  and  running  

Our  online  store  has  been  through  6  development  stages

2002  2000   2010  2004   2008  2006   2012   2014  

Get  online  and  focus  on  user  experience  

Fix  Back-­‐office  

Focus  on  user  experience  

Improve  integraHon  

E-­‐Commerce  complexity  

In  2012/13  we  faced  tougher  compeBBon  online  -­‐  e-­‐commerce  revenue  stopped  growing

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#  Orders   Spending/order  X  

#  Visits   #  Conversion  %  

User  Experience  Product  selecHon  

Cross  selling  

MarkeHng  PR  SEO  

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Revenue  per  week  

Summer  2013  a  relaunch  project  was  launched  to  restart  growth  -­‐  Three  issues  to  fix  idenBfied

Improve  organic  Google  search  findability  

(SEO)  Increase  conversion  rate   Increase  value  of  

shopping  basket  Traffic     Conversion  rate%   Value  

*   *   Revenue  =  

Fix  URL  issue  and  modernize  technical  pladorm    

Improve  internal  search   Improve  cross  selling  through  product  suggesHons  

(ASP-­‐>.Net)   Findwise  Solr.  Search  engine  

Redesign  user  experience  

We  made  search  more  visible  and  included  it  in  the  main  navigaHon  bar  

We  created  a  search  dialog  to  aid  the  customer  when  searching  

We  created  a  search  dialog  to  aid  the  customer  when  searching  

Pink  

We  tried  to  increase  Cross  selling  by  improving  “product  suggesHons”        Products  that  fits  together  with…  (manual  linking)          Similar  Products  (search  engine  driven!)  

…  the  project  gave  immediate  results

8  weeks  of  Christmas  shopping  in  2012  (orange)  and  2013  (blue)  

New  web  site  launched  20.  November  2013  

+32,28%  growth  in  Revenue  -­‐8,42%  Revenue  

…  and  the  results  seems  to  last  over  Bme 10  months  with  an  average  of  22%  growth  in  conversion  rate  

Investment  paid  back  in  approx.  7  months!  

SEO  has  had  a  significant  impact  on  traffic  -­‐  and  opened  for  reducing  adwords  spending

8  weeks  of  christmas  shopping  in  2012  and  2013   Overall  traffic                    up  16%  Google  /  organic        up  133%  Google  /  paid            down  22%  Direct  traffic    up  12%  

Organic  traffic    

cost  savings  

All  product  menus  are  search  driven  -­‐  any  click  within  the  red  marked  areas  will  trigger  a  findwise  search  string  

An  example:      -­‐  User  click  on  Leker/babyleker

Search  string  that  is  launched:    hop://ss01.sprell.no:8080/searchws/ident/sprell/searcher/jellyfish/search.json?category_h=leker%20%20§%20babyleker%20%20&category_menu=leker%20%20&q=*:*  

 Result  returned  in  JSON  format     Fast  response  

A  search  driven  site  has  important  advantages  -­‐  and  some  disadvantages  

•  “Very  fast…just  incredible  fast,  impossible  to  make  the  product  menus  working  that  fast  with  tradiHonal  SQL  queries”  (quote  from  our  developer  at  Kingspoint  AS)  

•  “To  build  the  facet  menu  and  do  the  sorHng  in  the  product  lisHng  pages  with  tradiHonal  SQL  would  be  very  complicated  and  costly.”  (quote  from  our  developer  at  Kingspoint  AS)  

 •  Increased  complexity  with  more  specialists  involved  

both  in  development  and  maintenance    

•  Slightly  less  control  when  publishing  products,  since  more  of  the  site  content  is  automated  (sorHng,  prioriHzing  of  products,  etc..)  

The  search  driven  site  approach  made  it  possible  to  relaunch  the  site,  without  replacing  the  back-­‐end,  resulHng  in  significant  cost  savings  and  shorter  development  Hme    

Summary

•  ImplemenHng  a  professional  internal  search  put  Sprell.no  back  on  track  in  terms  of  growth  

•  The  investment  had  a  payback  Hme  of  approximately  7  months  

•  The  search  driven  site  approach:  •  has  prolonged  the  lifeHme  of  our  old  back-­‐office  soluHon  with  2-­‐3  years  •  helped  solving  the  SEO  issue  in  a  fast  and  cost  effecHve  way