Site search is vital for helping mobile users find what they’re looking for in a hurry. This section offers tips for maximizing the value of your site’s search.
Position site search near the top of your homepage via an open text field.
Users looking for specific information usually turn to search, so search should be one of the first things mobile users see on your site. In the study, participants responded best to easily visible, open-text search boxes at the top of a page.
2. Ensure site search results are relevant
Make sure site search returns the strongest results first, and implement smart-search features like auto-complete and spelling corrections.
Participants didn’t bother to swipe through multiple pages of search results. Instead, they judged a site’s search based on the results it returned first; so make sure your first page of search results are the strongest. Make life easier for users on small screens with smart-search features like auto-complete and corrected misspelling.
3. Implement filters to improve site search usability
Offer filters to help users get what they need from search, but make sure users can’t filter a search to return zero results.
Participants relied on filters to narrow down search results, and actually abandoned sites that couldn’t reduce volume. One car-dealer site allowed participants to specify configurations that didn’t actually exist. Ensure users don’t filter themselves into a box and help them avoid problems by letting them know how many results will be returned with a particular filter applied.
4. Guide users to better site search results
If your offerings can be easily narrowed by segment, asking a few questions up front helps ensure visitors see relevant results.
For sites that serve diverse customer segments, it can be helpful to ask users a few questions before they search to ensure they get results from the most relevant content segment. For example, a large shoe retailer began its mobile searches by having participants select the gender and size of shoe they were looking for.
randomuser1223 on June 1st, 2017 at 00:34 UTC »
"Was this article helpful?"
No.
"How can we improve?"
By actually implementing a search function worth the name in Google Play Store.
thatguydrinksbeer on May 31st, 2017 at 23:41 UTC »
Google Play search is like Netflix search, they don't really care what you want, it's all about what they want.
I_Bin_Painting on May 31st, 2017 at 23:36 UTC »
I'm positive that the reason filtering isn't allowed on the Play store is that Google know too fucking well that it's a slippery slope to people filtering out the IAP-supported bullshit in there that makes them so much money.
Sorry if this sounds a bit tin foil hat, but it's almost impossible to quickly find decent apps through the play store itself, unless you already know the name of the app you're looking for.