The #1 Feature Frustrating Buyers with B2B User Experience
Distributors and manufacturers, it’s go time. Many of you have eCommerce sites, many are working towards getting it up. But is your on-site search box ruining your customer experience? The search box continually ranks #1 as the top thing that frustrates buyers with the B2B user experience.
This common mistake is actually a huge opportunity for manufacturers and distributors. The search box offers you a competitive advantage if done right! Unfortunately, the search box is one of the last things that manufacturers and distributors consider when embarking on an eCommerce project.
Why is search so important? The best B2B manufacturers and distributors have concentrated in this space and built search into their projects. Addressing the content and search first in an eCommerce project is going to empower you to become a digital disruptor. Between improving the customer experience on-page to gaining access to customer data, it’s a win-win.
Amazon to Grainger- their search box is the #1 used feature.
Does Your Search Box Ruin Your User Experience?
On-site B2B search is complex- lots of attributes, lots of variants, lots of images, hundreds of thousands, or more products. Most customers will not utilize your navigation to dig into 4-5 sub-categories. Customers expect a one-click experience, using search, with the results they desire.
-A good search is based on good product data. The best companies have both good search and good product data. Make product content a priority in your organization and continually improve upon it. There is no start and stop date for this type of project.
-Search should be personalized and in the context of your customer and inventory availability. For example, if your customer has a contract to buy certain products then when searching your site they should be able to easily search and find those products prominently displayed. If products aren’t in stock, they either shouldn’t be displayed in the search or be displayed towards the end. Customers should also be able to narrow your catalog down to what they have ordered in the past. Even more granular, if they are authorized to purchase only certain products, only those products should be displayed. It makes sense, but unfortunately, most distributors aren't doing it.
-Part number matching and automated spell check are imperative. Between mistypes and missed dashes, this can make or break your search. You need to be able to strip out the special characters and do part number matching along with an automated spell check in your search box.
Learn how our client Jessup Manufacturing saw a 400% growth in conversion by improving their B2B online experience.
Search Boxes Give You Access to More Data
The search box provides more than just a better customer experience, it gives your brand access to TONS OF CUSTOMER DATA! You can better understand how people search and what terms they are searching for. This allows you to learn what converts and doesn’t convert. Take this information and funnel all that data learning back into the search experience and overall customer experience.
Final Thoughts
When a B2B user visits your website, you have no idea what they are looking for or what problem they are trying to solve. Even if you knew the problem, do you know how they want to solve it (do they have a product number, brand name, generic attributes?). You just don’t know. Search allows your user to find what they are looking for and how they want to find it.
On-site search optimization is a program that should be improved upon month over month, year over year. It is the ongoing work that is a critical part of your success. Looking at terms, matching against your sellers, reviewing top-selling products. You need to continually optimize the ordering of your search results to be relevant to what should sell to this customer. This takes deep analytics. It doesn’t need to be hard or expensive, but you do need to put this place (this is beyond Google Analytics, although that is important too). We all know how frustrating a bad search experience can be. Staring at the zero results found page is beyond frustrating- it is enough to make you hop off the page and go elsewhere.
Contact Echidna’s User Experience Team to discuss your on-site search today.
