Search Marketing & Shopping Behaviors
One thing that many search marketers neglect to realize is that shopping behaviors vary from niche to niche. Search patterns in one niche are going to be different than search patterns in others.
A few of my friends run a niche search engine called The Trendy Purse. It’s an affiliate based niche search engine where revenue is generated by pulling lots of disparate product lines and online stores into a single shopping experience. Over the last few weeks I’ve been studying the dynamics of the purse/handbag shopping experience to try to help them out a bit.
One of the most interesting things we’ve discovered since starting our analysis is that there seem to be three primary methods of shopping. There is brand based search shopping where the person already knows exactly what brand or product they are looking for. This type of shopping tends to have the highest conversion rate. If someone knows they want a 2010 Ford Focus, and the walk onto the lot at a Ford dealership with the intention of buying one, they are very likely to come home with a 2010 Ford Focus. Compare that to someone who is looking for an sub-compact economy car. Such a person would probably visit several different dealerships from several different car manufacturers. Which is an example of our next type of shopping behavior, the generic brand, specific keyword shopping. A person may not know the exact product they are looking for, but they’ve got it narrowed down. Finally, there is the eyes-wide-open browsing method – someone looking for that perfect product but not knowing it’s features until they see it. Not only is this the hardest type of customer to convert, it’s the hardest type of product to build a niche search engine around.
So let’s get back to The Trendy Purse site. Upon doing an analysis, we’re seeing evidence that while there’s a little a bit of brand based searching and a little bit of generic phrase searching, the overwhelming majority of people are in eyes-wide-open browsing mode.
After talking to several women, we’ve discovered that this is indeed the way women like to approach purse/handbag shopping. Women enjoy browsing handbags until “the one” pops out and just says “buy me!”
So, the big question for the guys at The Trendy Purse now appears to be: how do you use a niche search engine to best capitalize on a niche that is primarily about browsing?
The solution: translate browsing into search.
In other words, create browse-able search units and work as hard as possible to build a solid set of browse-centric entry pages.
Share your thoughts!!!