On-site search is your highest intent channel. Most e-commerce sites still treat it as a utility.

At Bluegrass Digital, we recently explored the value of search while working on our latest ecommerce build. Our analysis revealed clear behavioural differences between users who engage with search and those who do not.

Visitors who use search are not just navigating. They are telling you exactly what they want, and our data shows they are far more engaged than other users:

• Spend three times longer on site than non-search users
  
• Generate more than double the page views
  
• Have a bounce rate almost half that of non-search users
  
• Account for a disproportionate share of engaged sessions

These findings demonstrate that internal search is one of the highest intent touchpoints on any ecommerce site.

Why this matters for e-commerce brands

High intent users are a premium audience. They explore, compare and make decisions. Ignoring how they interact with internal search is leaving engagement and potential revenue on the table.

As Mark Hawkins, director at Bluegrass, explains:

"Internal search is where intent meets behaviour. A visitor using search has already signalled they know what they want. Ensuring they find it quickly and efficiently can be the difference between a purchase and a lost opportunity."

The technology behind effective search

The performance of internal search depends on technology and architecture. A flexible CMS like Umbraco allows brands to integrate the search solution that matches their business needs. This could be:

• Built-in search like Umbraco Examine for simpler catalogues
  
• External search engines like Meilisearch, Algolia or Elasticsearch for larger or multi-market catalogues

Each option has trade-offs in speed, relevance control and filtering capabilities.

For example, on a recent build for Allens Hire, a leading UK events and equipment hire company, Bluegrass integrated Meilisearch within Umbraco. The result was a search experience that delivered:

• Faster indexing and response times
  
• More relevant results tailored to user queries
  
• Flexible filtering for complex catalogues

The outcome was that users found products faster, engagement increased, and the platform could scale to support a growing catalogue.

Key takeaways for e-commerce teams

Internal search is not just a utility. It is a critical behavioural signal and a driver of engagement. Analytics clearly show that search users are more invested, more exploratory and more likely to convert.

E-commerce teams who optimise search and invest in the right technology are not only improving user experience but also unlocking the full value of the traffic they already have.