Measurable Value - What the Long Tail Really Means to Online Stores

 

An article by Ofer Alt, CEO Celebros.com

At Celebros, we’ve built our reputation on delivering outstanding, measurable value to customers. Our Site Search solution helps customers maximize revenue by properly servicing the “Long Tail,” a source of often missed revenue.

Most e-retailers understand that their Top Search Queries (often called Top Search Terms) need to be validated to show relevant search results.  They tend to check the Top 20 or Top 50 search terms frequently and make manual adjustments to show relevant search results.

There is a better way to maximize this hidden source of revenue. By reviewing and optimizing  the full list of Top Search Queries, the information would become more accessible.  But it also a cost-prohibitive and daunting job.

So what’s the best way to maximize revenue? By using an intelligent site search engine, one that understands human language, map a visitor’s request  and find the available product in the store’s catalog.  Intelligent search will also recommend a similar item if the brand/category/item is not available.

Let me illustrate with the results one of our customers shared with us.  (visitors using over 15,000 search terms)

• Site Search traffic contributed to $72,200 per month

• The Top 50 search queries generated $6,100 p/m (only 8.5% of revenues!)

– meaning that 91.5% of the revenues were generated by the Long Tail!

• The Top 250 search queries generated $14,600 p/m (only 20.2% of revenues)

• The Top 500 search queries generated $23,200 p/m (only 32.1% of revenues)

This tells us that even if the retailer did an excellent job making sure that the Top 50 search terms show good results (assuming these don’t change on a daily/weekly basis (a wrong assumption) ), then the retailer has theoretically maximized only 5 to10% of revenue.

At Celebros, our solutions maximize the Long Tail by applying intelligent Semantic Search and conversion technologies. Therefore, every search term is analyzed and relevant, and accurate results are presented without the need to manually test and configure the information.

 

Ofer A.

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Tags: Celebros, conversion technologies, hidden source, relevant search results, semantic search, site search engine