Mighty Leaf Tea and SLI Systems Help Online Customers Find their Favorite Brew

Online Tea Retailer See 80% Click-through Rate on Top Five Searches with SLI’s Hosted Site Search

CUPERTINO, CA – July 28, 2009 – Before online tea retailer Mighty Leaf Tea implemented site search from SLI Systems, online shoppers had to know exactly what brand and type of tea they wanted before they started their searches – browsing among product categories via search was not an option. Now that SLI’s Learning Search is in place at Mighty Leaf Tea, shoppers can refine their searches by price, world region, tea ingredients, and even moods such as “formal” or “relaxing.”

Prior to launching a redesigned site last fall, Mighty Leaf Tea’s site search was packaged with its e-commerce storefront. “The search function was extremely limited – if a customer misspelled the name of a product, or searched for something that we don’t carry, they would simply receive an empty search result,” said Bliss Dake, vice president, e-commerce and operations for Mighty Leaf Tea. “There was no way to offer suggestions for similar products, or to allow customers to search according to different parameters, such as price or type of tea.” With SLI Systems running their search, Mighty Leaf Tea sees an average 79.8% click-through rate on their top 5 search results.

Dake and his colleagues sought a cost-effective but fully featured site search that would integrate easily with Mighty Leaf Tea’s other e-commerce solutions. Learning Search from SLI is a hosted site search solution that “learns” from past search activity by tracking visitors' aggregate search queries and click-throughs, and uses that data to deliver results based on popularity. Visitors can then refine their results by eight criteria to find the product(s) they seek, including: price range, rating, number of reviews, category, caffeine, region, ingredients and mood.

“Not only do we now offer a much richer search experience for our customers, we’re able to do so in a way that works for our business,” Dake said. “Since SLI solutions are hosted, we don’t have to worry about using precious resources to manage another technology product – it’s done for us. And Learning Search allows us to build on other tools we already have.”

For instance, Mighty Leaf Tea customers can post product ratings and reviews using technology from Bazaarvoice, which integrates with SLI’s Learning Search, allowing site visitors to see which products are the most highly rated within their search results. By working with SLI’s post-sales customer success team, the Mighty Leaf Tea site will soon add ratings within search results (among other features), making it even easier for shoppers to identify their most-wanted tea products.

“New visitors to our site, who may not know the brands and types of tea that we carry, are now much more likely to navigate quickly and efficiently through our product selection,” Dake said. “When they find products easier and faster, they’re more likely to make a purchase.”

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 automated SEO 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 behavior 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 www.sli-systems.com, read the company’s blog at http://blog.sli-systems.com/ or follow the company’s Twitter feed at www.twitter.com/slisystems.