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Date:05 August 2010

KAREN MILLEN DRIVES ONLINE SALES WITH SLI SYSTEMS

Customers visiting Karen Millen’s website (www.karenmillen.com) can now find what they’re looking for more easily and have a better online experience, with the implementation of ‘Learning Search’ from SLI Systems. The fashion retailer is also seeing increased basket values among visitors using search, compared with those who don’t.

The hosted on-site search technology, which learns from visitor site behaviour, enables customers in more than 20 countries to quickly find exactly what they’re looking for first time, as well as refine their search by criteria such as department, colour or collection.

Learning Search also offers detailed metrics and reporting capabilities, which is helping the team in-house to understand exactly what customers are searching for and the terms they’re using for specific items.

This better understanding of customers is being used to develop improved on-site merchandising and tailored customer emails, but also feeds into other elements of marketing such as SEO and social media initiatives – with most popular topics or searches feeding into the company’s blog posts and email newsletters to help make them as relevant as possible to customers.

Emma Bonar, E Commerce Manager at Karen Millen, said: “Our website is our biggest store and, just like in a ‘bricks and mortar’ shop, it’s essential that people can easily find what they’re looking for. Without the help of a shop assistant, the only way to do that is to understand our customers better and improve the search function on the site. Working with SLI Systems, that’s exactly what we’ve been able to do. As well as providing improved search capabilities that mean visitors can find what they’re looking for on the first page and refine the results, Learning Search also provides the team with information that we can use across our marketing and customer interactions.”
SLI Systems has developed a whitepaper entitled On-site search best practice: revolutionising the way people buy online designed to help companies operating online to improve their on-site search and to understand how to integrate the data into other elements of its marketing. To receive a copy, visit http://www.sli-systems.com/improving-the-way-people-buy-online-uk.php.

About Karen Millen

Karen Millen has over 260 locations in 35 countries from the UK to Russia, Asia, and the Middle East with further international expansion plans for 2010. We produce 12 collections each season covering day, work, occasion and weekend wear. Everything in the collections is designed in-house, from the lace used in our famed eveningwear to the embossed hardware on statement bags. In-house pattern cutters complete the team, and help to perfect the flattering fit for which we’re famed.

About Learning Search

SLI’s patented “Learning Search” intelligent search technology “learns” from user behaviour by tracking the search terms people use on a retailer’s site and the resulting items they click on to deliver search results based on popularity. Learning Search improves the online experience for web site visitors and ensures the products people are searching for show up in the right searches – whether those searches are conducted on their own sites or on a web search engine like Google. More than 300 sites use SLI Systems’ hosted search offerings, including Interflora.co.uk, Karenmillen.com, Shore.co.uk and Which.co.uk among others.

About SLI Systems

SLI Systems is the developer of learning-based search and navigation technology for corporate Internet sites, e-commerce destinations and consumer Internet portals that Searches, Learns and Improves the user experience. SLI Systems’ hosted site search and user-generated SEO (http://www.sli-systems.com/site_champion.php) solutions empower businesses to enhance customer satisfaction while increasing sales, reducing costs and yielding valuable customer information. Unlike traditional search software, SLI Systems’ patented technology continuously “learns” from the behaviour of visitors over time to deliver more relevant results. SLI Systems is a privately held company, with offices in Silicon Valley, London, and Christchurch, New Zealand. For more information, visit http://www.sli-systems.com, or see the company’s blog at http://blog.sli-systems.com/.

For more information, please contact:

Chris Holder or Phil Dwyer at Brand X PR
Email: cholder@brandxpr.com / pdwyer@brandxpr.com
Telephone: 020 7099 3860