Menswear, homeware, and design retailer The Union Project is Merchandising Cloud's latest UK client
The Challenge
A proudly independent operation, The Union Project began as a self-funded, self-initiated enterprise driven by two recent University graduates.
During their studies, co-founders Chris Capewell and Max Shaw realized they shared a common goal – to evolve the shopping experience available in their hometown of Cheltenham, England.
Upon finishing their studies, the duo did just that – and launched a menswear outlet offering a new, unique style to the previously underserved men of Cheltenham.
Despite a tough economy, The Union Project thrived. After a few years, Chris and Max moved the store to a bigger location, allowing them to branch out into additional areas – design, homeware, and apothecary.
Recently, the focus has been on growing the online side of the business. To that end, the dynamic co-founders recently enlisted the services of Merchandising Cloud, a leading site search and personalization software provider.
The Solution
What is Merchandising Cloud and what does it do?
Merchandising Cloud is an advanced ecommerce tool which uses advanced AI and machine-learning algorithms to change the order in which each individual shopper sees each product – meaning each user has the most optimized personalized journey, without the need for any manual work.
This helps ecommerce merchants increase revenue, increase conversion, optimize speed, and improve UX for an optimized ecommerce purchase journey.
Following a recent integration, Merchandising Cloud’s Personalized Search and Smart Collections solutions are now live on The Union Project’s Shopify-powered site.
How do these solutions help ecommerce businesses?
The Personalized Search solution means customers of The Union Project will now be able to find their preferred items quicker and easier. Search queries will have auto-complete options, while advanced spelling tolerance will ignore spelling mistakes and also provide instant results while typing.
This solution ensures retailers are always displaying the most relevant products, by re-ordering them using a personalization algorithm. It also serves to nudge search behaviour through “inspirational search” – displaying trending searches and trending products.
The Results
The Smart Collections solution, meanwhile, offers similar benefits, but for collections instead of search.
Personalized product rankings again ensure customers are shown the items that are most relevant to them as individuals, while dynamic filters give shoppers the tools they need to narrow down the products in a collection according to their preferences.
The Smart Collections tool also includes the merchandising rules feature – the ability to complement the AI’s maximization of conversion with alternative strategies such as boosting brand collaborations or items with high margins or stock levels.
Both solutions include search analytics which enable merchants to better understand the behaviour of their shoppers, giving them access to extremely valuable, and actionable, insights.
The Union Project
A proudly independent operation, The Union Project began as a self-funded, self-initiated enterprise driven by two recent University graduates. During their studies, co-founders Chris Capewell and Max Shaw realized they shared a common goal – to evolve the shopping experience available in their hometown of Cheltenham, England. Upon finishing their studies, the duo did just that – and launched a menswear outlet offering a new, unique style to the previously underserved men of Cheltenham.
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