Customer Review Solution - Ecommerce Reporting: SearchFit Ecommerce Shopping Cart v8.1 Released
It’s time to give your ecommerce website a summer tune-up with some of the valuable features available in the SearchFit Ecommerce Shopping Cart v8.1. There is a lot packed into this update, but highlights include a new Customer Review Solution and enhanced Ecommerce Reporting System.
Customer Review Solution
Boost your conversion rate and positive word-of-mouth referrals to your website using the new, built-in Customer Review Solution. Let your customers participate in your website by reading & writing reviews and you will improve your online community. We are happy to announce the new Customer Review Solution as part of SearchFit Ecommerce Shopping Cart v8.1.
Benefits of Product Ratings & Reviews
Product reviews often give your customer that last bit of information needed to make a purchasing decision. The ability to differentiate between the good, average and poor products will make your website more customer friendly.
Internet Retailer.com reported the following benefits of Product Reviews as researched by ForeSee:
- “Shoppers on sites with customer product reviews were 5% more likely to buy from the retailer the next holiday season and 4% more likely to purchase from the retailer the next time they are in the market for similar merchandise.”
- “Shoppers that visited sites with customer product reviews are 6% more likely to recommend the site than are shoppers that went to sites without this feature.”
- “Of holiday shoppers that bought from sites with reviews, 39% cited the customer product review as the primary factor that influenced the purchase. And 42% of first-time buyers on sites with customer product reviews cited the review as the primary factor in their decision to make a purchase.”
Customer Review Solution: How it Works
The Customer Review Solution allows you to display a rating per product on your category pages and detailed product pages. Your category pages show a 0-5 star rating per product plus the number of reviews per product. The number of reviews is a clickable link that launches a dynamic panel where the customer is able to read & comment on reviews as well as write her own review.
On your detailed product pages, additional items are shown, such as a ratings bar chart and link to “write your own review”.
The reviews system offers your customers a deep level of interaction. They may post a review, as well as post comments on other reviews. This allows and encourages a conversation between customers about your products. Reviews can be marked as helpful, or not and later sorted by your customers according to their helpful status. Special icons and statuses can be granted to your customers to encourage them to participate in your reviews system. Examples include “approved poster” 
, “purchaser of product” 
and “purchased from this store” 
.
Product Reviews Panel
Settings are available for the Product Reviews solution that allow you to decide if customers must register & login in order to post a review or comment. Settings also allow you to decide if reviews are automatically posted, or must be approved first. Your customers may flag reviews as inappropriate and you will automatically receive a notification.
Customer Reviews Solution Features:
- Ratings display per product includes stars, bar chart & number of reviews link.
- Visitors may read and write reviews per product.
- Visitors may read and Write Comments Per Review
- Visitors may sort reviews by Newest First, Most Helpful First and Most Critical.
- Visitors may report abuse per Review or Comment.
- Visitors may mark the Review or Comment as “Helpful” or not. This allows the Comments & Reviews to be sorted by “Most Helpful First”.
- Store owner may set special statuses for reviewers like approved poster, purchaser of product and purchased from store.
- Store owner can set reviews and comments to be added to the website automatically, or only after approval.
- Store owner can allow all visitors to post a review or comment, or just those who have registered/logged in.
Ecommerce Reporting - New Sales and Visitor Reports Available
A new visitors report is available that includes a line chart of visits & hits by hour day, month and year. This allows you to get general visitor statistics without using a third-party application.
The Sales reports section contains 3 new types of sales reports that will give you a better picture of the performance of your category types, categories and products. The new reports allow you to quickly identify the performance of each of your category types, categories and products. The Top Sellers by Profit report (revenue – cost price) combines analytics reporting with the real cost of your products, giving you a quick, valuable picture of a product or category’s real contribution to your bottom line.
Each of the below Ecommerce Reports includes an interactive Pie chart. Clicking a slice on one chart can update the contents of another. All reports are filterable by date and can be exported to .csv (comma separated value format). SearchFit ecommerce reporting gives you a quick measure of your strengths and weaknesses without having to pull data from multiple applications.
New Ecommerce Sales Reports:
- Top Selling Category Types, Categories and Products by Quantity
- Top Selling Category Types, Categories and Products by Revenue
- Top Selling Category Types, Categories and Products by Profit (Revenue – Cost Price of Products Sold)
Ecommerce Reporting - Top Selling Products By Profit
More New Ecommerce Shopping Cart Features
For a full list of features new to v8.1, please see the official version documentation: http://searchfit.us.com/forums/about2083.html
- Enhanced SEO Naming Rules.
- Store owner can now configure the Verisign credit card processor engine to issue a pre-authorization for $1 transaction.
- New keywords available for the main templates: AUTO_GENERATED_MENU_WEBSITE_id: will be replaced with the autogenerated Website Menu.
- New “Paid Date” field per order that is automatically populated when the order changes its paid status.
- The Control Panel Help System is now in webhelp and on-screen format.
