Read this article on how to add search on site for more information.
In this day and age, it’s almost impossible to run a business without some sort of web presence. Let’s face it, phonebooks are dead and word of mouth can only take you so far. Whether it’s a Facebook page or a Google+ site, people need to find your company online. Pre-built social media sites are a good start, but to really get serious about your online footprint, you’ll need your own, personalized website. And the features that are built into that site are just as important as the information the pages contain. One of the questions that often arise when designing a site is whether or not a website search box is a necessary feature on your site.
Giving the people who visit your website the ability to easily find the information that they are looking for is a key ingredient in creating a user-friendly website. Website navigation that is easy to use and understand is essential to user-friendliness, but sometimes website visitors need more than intuitive navigation to find the content that they are seeking. This is where a website search feature can come in handy.
Do you need a search box on your website?
Some basic research will point to some statistics about search features. For example, most people who use a website’s search bar generally click on it immediately after accessing the page. This suggests that users do use the feature to navigate the site. Now if you are looking at a website of only a few pages, it may not be necessary, but anything over that, it is probably going to come in handy for your visitors. And if there one important aspect of web design that can’t be ignored, it’s how user-friendly it is.
A website search box can capture query data. Next to usability, the most important aspect of a web presence is data collection. We want to know as much about our visitors as we can. This helps us shape our business plan to meet their needs thus building a stronger and more competitive company. So the utilization of a search featured coupled with some analytics software (there are many providers and they are often easy to implement), you’re building your business from the back end.
How to Add a Search on your Site
Making a search engine is easier than ever before. With hosted search-as-a-service providers taking up the pain of building most of the search engines, the end-users’ role is limited to adding an HTML code snippet on their website to take the search live.
Here we will visit the steps required to add the ExpertRec Custom search engine to your website. This is one of the easiest setup processes of all the available options out there and is highly recommended.
- Navigate to https://cse.expertrec.com/newuser?platform=cse and signup with your Google ID.
- Enter your website’s URL when prompted. You can select a server location near you and add the URL of your sitemap if you wish to. These will be auto-detected otherwise.
- You can play around with the settings and customize the UI as the crawl runs. Once it is complete, you can check out a fully functional demo before taking the search to your website.
- You can take the search to your website with little to no effort. All you need to do is to paste the code snippet available on the dashboard on your website.
ExpertRec comes with more customization options that you can explore. You can read this article to find a more detailed guide on the installation and configuration.
In short, a search function is a helpful tool for both your visitors and your business and there are many options out there to suit a wide array of needs. What is important is that you find a solution that best fits your needs at the right cost.
