You have to spend time optimizing your store's search page because these days it does not get enough attention from shopping cart developers. Resources are spent more on flashy features while the old search page gets neglected. It should not be this way. Your search results page is extremely important and can boost your bottom line. A simple change that can make a difference to your clients is adding a message to your search results page when no relevant results are found.
Considering the following search page with no results:
It is a vanilla search page. It has a harsh red error message and displays a "News & Information" tab that contains no relevant search results. It also offers no way for the client to do something about the failed search. The client is stuck and will click on the back button to restart the search process or just leave and find another store with a better search experience.
Now take a look at the improved page:
Here are the improvements that we made:
- Removed the "News & Information" tab since it has no search results
- Changed the background color from red to green to make it more inviting
- Inform the client that they can reach out to a live chat agent to help them find the product that they are looking for
You can also use the no search results page to gather information about products that you should be carrying in your store. For example, you can setup a notification each time a client searches for a product that returns zero results. If you want to be more proactive, you can automatically start a live chat with a client when there are no search results. Either way, the client gets a better search experience and you as a shop owner can start making the most out of every interaction with your client in order to sell more products.
It is this attention to detail that can make the difference between a sale or a bounce back to Google. Do you have any other tips on improving search pages? If you do, then share them here for others to implement.