Iomega International S.A. upgrades to MondoSearch with BehaviorTracking
MondoSearch is like having a full time employee working 24 hours a day, taking positive action to improve search on our behalf
Introduction
Iomega Corporation, a global leader in data storage celebrating 25 years in business, provides high value storage solutions to help people protect, capture and share digital information. The company's award-winning Data Storage products include the REV™ Removable Storage Drives, Network Attached Storage Solutions, the Zip® 750MB, 250MB and 100MB Drives, High Performance External Hard Drives, Iomega Mini and Micro Mini™ USB Flash Drives, All-Format External DVD Writers, and USB-Powered Floppy Disk Drives.
Before implementing Mondosoft's search solution, Iomega's search consisted of basic indexing and nothing more. They reviewed many alternatives before deciding to implement Mondosoft's search solution across their international web properties iomega-europe.com and iomega-asia.com
Niall O'Gorman, the Web Operations Manager at the International headquarters of Iomega Corporation, is responsible for the strategic direction of Iomega International's online direct sales portfolio.
The portfolio managed by Mr O'Gorman was designed to support Iomega's sales channel, chiefly providing product information to stores and end users. Their sales channel is international, and includes retailers such as MediaMarkt, Dabs, Misco, FNAC, Auchan, Bechtle, Carrefour, Staples, Ingram, Darty and Inmac, as well as distributors, VARs and system integrators.
With the coming-of-age of e-commerce, the site's information focus has shifted gradually to offer direct sales to end users to complement existing channel sales activity. The challenge for Iomega is to preserve and support channel activities while increasing the overall direct revenue.
The Problem: Fine-tuning Search Results
For site search, Iomega previously used a free ASP version of a popular online search tool for www.iomega-europe.com and www.iomega-asia.com. They found this tool inflexible and troublesome - causing more problems than it solved.
When Mr O'Gorman decided to replace the existing search with a more sophisticated solution he was immediately impressed by MondoSearch and the intelligence behind it. Compared to other products he considered Mondosoft's solution was much more sophisticated while, at the same time, being easy to use. Iomega needed multi-lingual functionality, local support in Europe as well as personalized search options. Iomega opted for Mondosoft's hosted site search solution, comprised of MondoSearch, BehaviorTracking and Information Manager. Mondosoft's optional hosting model made the entire solution straightforward to implement and maintain - ideal for a small team to operate successfully.
We simply review and make adjustments if required. As a result we are very satisfied with how the product is working for our customers.
Multiple Languages
Multi-lingual search capability was an essential requirement for Iomega's International web sites. MondoSearch's language scope feature allows search queries to filter into different language groups, and Iomega's visitors can view search results and a user interface in one of the four languages provided on the sites: English, French, German and Italian. A "universal" scope was also deployed on www.iomega-europe.com to monitor the data on each language.
Templates Keep Things Simple
Mondosoft offers a .NET Search Kit, including easy-to-use templates that can be easily deployed to fit any design specification. One template is designed to fit multi-lingual sites, another provides a simple layout based on a three-column format, and a third provides an interface that resembles popular global search pages.
Iomega modified the existing sample templates to make the results look similar to what you would expect to find when using global search engines like Google, Yahoo or MSN. Our thought process was to present something that was already familiar to our customers
According to Mr. O'Gorman, "This was a very straightforward and painless process with MondoSearch".
Mondosoft Solution: From Personalized Search to Search Analytics
Right from the start, Mondosoft has helped organize Iomega's information successfully. Thanks to the search header functionality, which has been personalized for Iomega to return results in multiple languages, we could deliver the right products to our customers regardless of the default results. According to Mr. O'Gorman,
Personalized Search Headers based on live search query's are one of the solution's best features, allowing us to easily present targeted content, promotions and technical updates to our customers in real time
In August 2005, as Iomega prepared to launch a new product family (MiniMax™Desktop Hard Drives) they began monitoring the search with BehaviorTracking. They immediately saw that a large number of visitors had already begun searching for information about the new MiniMax™ 250GB and 160GB Drives - before they had published content about the new products.
Iomega needed to act quickly, so they linked the search queries for "MiniMax" to the content that they had at hand by employing personalized search headers within the InformationManager, which forms part of the Mondosoft product suite.
Within 30 minutes we had gone from zero results to relevant, targeted content in four languages which exactly matched the users' expectations
explains Mr. O'Gorman.
Iomega also discovered how easy it was to link search terms directly to content using SearchNames, which they employed to create an easy way for people to search directly using product part numbers. This allowed them to bring the people directly to the product that they were interested in, bypassing the standard results altogether. It proved especially useful for Iomega's partners and sales people who needed quick access to product information in order to support Iomega's customers during the sales process.
Along with improved search results, BehaviorTracking search analytics sweetened the deal for Iomega, says Mr. O'Gorman.
BehaviorTracking is an excellent and, more importantly, easy snapshot of what is going on all across your web portfolio - presented in a simple dashboard with powerful drill down capabilities, providing you with all the required information. It enable you to be very reactive to your customers search demands.
Now Iomega's web sites can successfully reflect its dual focus: while they promote sales by effectively steering customers to a channel outlet or online shop, they are also a source of product information for resellers, affiliates, the Media and end users. Iomega is successfully serving everybody's needs, whether it is for information or for online purchases.
In Conclusion - "No IT Headache"
"Iomega used to depend on programmers to be able to do anything with our search tool. Now with Mondosoft's hosted search solution this is no longer necessary. We no longer have any of the traditional hosting and programming headaches to worry about, leaving us to get right down to the task of serving relevant search results to our customers and partners".
"Mondosoft provided Iomega with one on one support at every step while implementing their search solution. Iomega has enjoyed considerable success with our search program since we started working together. As a result I would have no hesitation in recommending the Mondosoft search solution." Niall O'Gorman - Web Operations Manager, Iomega International S.A.
About Iomega
Iomega Corporation provides easy-to-use, high value storage solutions to help people protect, secure, capture and share their valuable digital information. Iomega's award-winning storage products include the new Iomega REV™ Drive, popular Zip® 100MB, 250MB and 750MB Drives; high-performance Iomega® External Hard Drives; Iomega Mini USB Drives and Micro Mini™ USB Drives; Iomega external CD-RW Drives; Iomega Super DVD Drives and the QuikTouch™ Video Burner; and Iomega Floppy USB-Powered Drives. Iomega simplifies data protection and sharing at home and in the workplace with Iomega Automatic Backup software, Iomega Sync software, HotBurn® CD-recording software, and Active Disk™ technology. For networks, Iomega NAS servers offer capacities of 160GB to 1.6TB. For unlimited capacity and anytime, anywhere access, Iomega offers iStorage™ secure online storage. Iomega also offers businesses and consumers a comprehensive data recovery services solution for recovering lost data due to hardware failure, file corruption or media damage. The Company can be reached at 1-888-4- IOMEGA (888-446-6342), or on the Web at http://www.iomega.com/
Please contact Mondosoft for documentation on Iomega's increased efficiency