
AI has a lot of use cases and capabilities in the e-commerce industry. Undoubtedly, AI-based personalization is the foremost thing that comes to mind, but AI-based search is also an underrated tool that enhances customer experience to a significant extent. With AI search, customers get a streamlined search experience and relevant results for their queries.
In this article, we will go through various aspects of AI-powered search and how our search engine can help increase the customer conversion rate. It is a highly accessible extension that online merchants can use to integrate into the store. Let’s begin with the basics.
What is AI-powered search?
Search is one of the first tools by which a user starts interacting with an e-commerce store. Thus, it can make or break the first impression of your Magento store. An AI-powered search leverages AI to make the search process intelligent by interpreting the context of the website and the intent of the customer. It also learns from the website’s historical data and user queries to give more accurate and relevant results.
In the traditional search mechanism, the keywords of a searched query are matched against keywords stored in the search index. If the keywords match to a particular extent, then it delivers relevant search results. In some cases, the retailers go further to offer advanced search tools like autocompletion or autosuggest. It resolves the issue of typos, which cause the search engine to fail and yield no results.
The methodology of AI-powered search is entirely different. It is not limited to matching keywords but employs various technologies like Natural Language Processing and Deep Learning Techniques to improve the accuracy and relevancy of results. It decreases the amount of effort required to optimize product pages for SEO while also providing customers with exactly what they want and assisting businesses in displaying their enormous product catalogs.
With the introduction of Generative AI, the search has gone another mile. The models can be trained on a wide range of data that includes product descriptions, user reviews, and social media feeds. It is a highly intelligent technology that can even take the smallest cues to identify the interests of the customers.
How Does AI-Powered Search Work in an E-commerce Store?
Do you know that search abandonment costs $300 billion for US-based retailers just because there were irrelevant search results on their websites?
This shows the importance of the search engine in an e-commerce store. Our AI-based search engine not only delivers accurate search results but also provides personalized recommendations. It can also learn over a period of time which search results work and which do not. It polishes the mechanism of traditional search methods with advanced features to transform data into actionable insights.
Natural Language Processing:
Customers don’t always use precise names for products, but they are expected to use the natural way of finding a product, which is often unstructured and complex. Thus, the algorithms of traditional search engines don’t easily provide the search results. With Natural Language Processing, the search engine can understand the nuances of language and get to the intent behind a search query. NLP uses “facet extraction” to break down the product attributes in a search.
It employs syntax analysis to understand the arrangement of words in a sentence. It goes the extra mile by even understanding the grammar to understand exactly what the customer is searching for. Thus, the search works human-like, and the customer experience is also far better.
NLP bridges the gap between human and machine communication. In a traditional search, “winter clothes” wouldn’t yield any relevant result if there are no keywords in the search index as “winter clothes.” With AI-powered search, it will understand that clothes like blazers, sweaters, etc., will fall into the category of “winter clothes.”
Furthermore, NLP technology is capable of understanding colloquialisms and slang, which further improves the search.
Machine Learning:
In a physical store, the sales personnel can engage with the customers, understand their needs, and deliver a more personalized experience. This one-to-one interaction gets difficult in online stores unless you are leveraging AI.
With machine learning, the AI-powered search can mimic the way humans process information. If you link the product recommendation engine with customers’ data like customers’ most-viewed categories, products, and purchase history – the AI-powered search learns about what each customer does or doesn’t like and tailors recommendations accordingly.
For e.g., if the shopper has previously searched for “T-shirts” and browsed through a catalog and clicked on an “Olive T-shirt,” if the user later comes back to the website and searches for “olive…” the search engine will automatically recommend “Olive T-shirts” considering the previous browsing history of the customers.
Benefits of AI Search in E-commerce Store:
The AI-based search in E-commerce offers a plethora of benefits. Let’s go through the specific benefits of AI tools in your website search:
1. Sophisticated Keyword Model:
Earlier, the site search used to work on a keyword-focused model in which the users had to input keywords and find the matching search results on the e-commerce store. It led to a practice called keyword-stuffing.
But AI-based search works differently. By leveraging technology like natural language processing and semantic search, it can understand long-tail searches with their meanings, and there is no need to stuff keywords. It offers many benefits over traditional search:
- Easier and more versatile search functionality
- Smarter content creation
- Efficient keyword research
- More accurate search results
With machine learning, the AI-powered search can mimic the way humans process information. If you link the product recommendation engine with customers’ data like customers’ most-viewed categories, products, and purchase history – the AI-powered search learns about what each customer does or doesn’t like and tailors recommendations accordingly.
For e.g., if the shopper has previously searched for “T-shirts” and browsed through a catalog and clicked on an “Olive T-shirt,” if the user later comes back to the website and searches for “olive…” the search engine will automatically recommend “Olive T-shirts” considering the previous browsing history of the customers.
2. Advanced-Data Utilization:
Our AI-powered search engine uses advanced data techniques like vector search and hash search. Unlike traditional engines, which rely on organized data and established criteria, AI considers the relationship and sentiment of terms. This provides a more detailed understanding.
It can gather data from various sources like search queries, social media posts, phone calls, and messages. This data plays a pivotal role in gathering customer feedback, improving customer experience, and optimizing KPIs.
3. Personalization:
Personalization is a major benefit of AI-powered site search. Modern AI-based technologies are capable of processing vast amounts of data for a personalized customer experience. The ML algorithms can process user account activity to make personalized recommendations for the user. It can analyze the search patterns of customers with similar interests or demographics. This allows them to predict and present results relevant to the group.
4. Improved Speed and Accuracy:
AI-powered search offers faster search results vis-à-vis traditional searching methods. The advanced algorithms process queries swiftly, delivering precise search results to be used in a fraction of the time. It results in higher customer satisfaction, increased relevance and performance of search results, higher conversion rates, and customer retention.
5. Better Understanding of User Intent:
The AI-powered search excels in understanding user intent to reap the maximum benefits of intelligent search. It goes beyond simply showing products and detects when customers are looking for instructional or useful content. This nuanced understanding improves the overall search experience for users. It can optimize pricing strategies, create better marketing campaigns, boost customer satisfaction, and increase overall store performance.
How Can Ceymox Technologies help?
We have built an advanced AI-powered search engine that can supercharge your Magento store with AI-powered search. Our AI-powered search extension leverages cutting-edge AI and machine learning algorithms to deliver lightning-fast search results. It helps improve conversion rates and customer satisfaction. Here are a few key features of our AI-based Magento search extension:
1. AI-Powered Smart Search:
Powered by the latest Google Gemini AI models, it can understand complex queries and make the site search more intuitive and efficient than ever.
2. Natural Language Processing:
It understands human language so that customers can make searches using everyday phrases, resulting in more accurate and user-friendly searches.
3. ML-Driven Recommendations:
Driven by ML, the extension learns with every search made by a customer. Thus, there is continuous improvement in the relevance of search results based on customer behavior.
4. Customizable Search Widget:
You can easily put a personalized search widget anywhere on your website. With various filtering and sorting options, your consumers can tailor their search experience to discover exactly what they need in seconds.
5. Seamless integration with Magento:
The extension seamlessly integrates with Magento 2.4.x, offering easy installation, configuration, and updates.
KC Jagadeep, CEO of Ceymox, a leading Magento Development Agency based in India. KC is a passionate entrepreneur, Magento enthusiast, and advocate for open-source solutions, dedicated to enhancing the landscape of online commerce, particularly within the realm of Magento.Driven by the pursuit of creating and executing successful strategies and platforms for digital commerce, KC brings over 12 years of industry experience to the table. His mission is simple: to empower corporate eCommerce clients with effective digital commerce solutions and modern marketing practices, ultimately boosting profitability.As an entrepreneur with a proven track record in information technology and eCommerce services (including Magento and WooCommerce), KC possesses expertise in operations management, startups, various eCommerce platforms, and business process outsourcing.
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