How Smart Search & Filter works for Shopify

General Smart Search & Filter app by Searchanise is a sophisticated site search solution. It helps your customers find relevant information through products, collections, pages, and blog posts. All the product fields are searched: Name Description Product type Vendor Tags SKU for all product variants Barcode for all product variants Options for all product variants Collection names Metafields which are adjusted for search in the Searchanise configuration After the app has been installed in the store, the indexation starts. It takes some time. The app imports search data to its servers and indexes it for search. The search data includes: Products that have Sales channels and apps set as “Online Store” and are not hidden from search Sales channels and apps set as “Online Store” and are not hidden from search Collections that are available on Online Store available on Online Store Pages that are visible Blog posts that are visible The Smart Search & Filter app starts to work right after the first indexation has been completed. Further indexation of product changes occurs automatically every 10 minutes. The app is configured in the Smart Search & Filter control panel: Shopify admin panel > Apps > Smart Search & Filter. You’ll need to start the re-indexation manually to update the search results after you’ve: added, edited, or deleted collections, pages, blog posts (but products are indexed automatically every 10 minutes) changed currency formatting restored the search results page if you accidentally removed it changed the app integration for product reviews changed product location settings To start the re-indexation, click the Force re-indexation button in the Smart Search & Filter control panel > Dashboard tab. The prices are displayed according to the currency settings in your store. The app’s main functionality is provided by the Instant Search widget and the Search Results widget. Both of them are highly configurable. Functionality Instant Search Widget The Instant Search widget builds itself into your standard search bar. As soon as a customer starts typing a query in the search bar, the widget instantly drops down suggestions dynamically changing with each keystroke. If you do not have the search bar in the theme, you can add it following the How to add a search box in the Shopify theme instructions or just use the Sticky widget. Due to the restrictions in the Shopify API, the app scripts start loading only after the page is fully loaded. A delay may occur when the Searchanise widget is being loaded for the first time. To change this, follow the instructions. Read more about the configuration of the Instant Search widget here. Sticky Widget The Sticky widget is the icon for the search bar in the storefront. It is locked into place, so it doesn’t disappear when a customer scrolls down the page. The widget appears by default if there is no search bar in your store. Personalization The Personalization feature allows your search to return personalized results based on your customer’s previous product view history. Synonyms There is a possibility to set up Synonyms for the search terms. Synonyms adjust the accuracy of search results for particular search queries. Stop words The Stop Words feature helps to achieve even more relevant search results for your customers. Inside the tab, you can make a list of particular words to be ignored by the Searchanise search engine. The engine will skip those words while processing a user’s search query. Redirects There is a possibility to set up Redirects to landing pages for particular search terms. You can redirect to external pages or internal pages, collections, blog posts, etc. “Did you mean?” feature The “Did you mean?” feature helps to avoid giving the customer zero results for their search query. Search Results Widget The Search Results widget is a search results page with javascript code that is added to your online store. This widget gets search request responses from the Searchanise servers and shows the results in the dynamically generated HTML content. This HTML content is inserted into the Smart Search & FIlter code. Therefore there’s no liquid template in Shopify. You can customize the look and feel of the widget by playing with the color settings and applying Custom CSS. The Search Results widget contains filters. There are default filters with the most common attributes like price, vendor, product type, availability, collection, etc. You can adjust them or add new ones. Read more about the configuration of the Search Results widget here. Upsell & Cross-sell Upsell & Cross-sell feature is automatically-generated product recommendation blocks in your online store that allows your customers to discover new products easier. Filters on collections Filters on collections feature allows visitors to filter and sort products of a collection based on product attributes. If you enable Filters on collections your collection page will look like the Search Results widget, but without some specific search elements such as Products, Pages, Collections tabs. Merchandising You can set up merchandising rules for products, tags, and collections to promote specific items or groups of items. There is the ability to do it for particular search queries or any query. Analytics The Smart Search & Filter app gathers and introduces the data related to the activities and behavior of your customers: popular search queries and terms, top-performing products, queries that bring zero results, and many more. This data will help you drive improvements to your store, such as search performance optimization and introduction of new products. App integrations You can integrate the Smart Search & Filter app with other Shopify apps and use their functionality in the Smart Search & Filter app’s widgets. The integration is possible with the following apps: Subscription After you’ve installed the app, you will have a 14-day trial period. The trial period is unlimited for development stores until transferring them to clients. To have permanent access to some of Searchanise features, you need to buy a subscription. The cost of the monthly Smart Search & Filter subscription will be included in the Shopify Invoice and you will pay for the app together with the Shopify store fee. Read more about subscription purchase here. Support If you have any questions or you need help with the app configuration or the app performance, you can contact us. We will be happy to help you.
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