Smart Discovery is a visual search solution that dynamically recommends visitors what to search. Based on a visitor's affinities, their current location on the site, and what's currently popular on the site, Smart Discovery shows the visitor a personalized selection of recommended searches, or Smart Discovery suggestions. Each suggestion is displayed as a clickable UI element and represents a specific group of relevant items, such as "Blue Skirts" (products on a retail site) or "5 Reel Slots" (games on an iGaming site). Clicking an element opens the search results page for the corresponding search.

For example, if a retail site visitor is currently browsing the Power Tools section of the site, and if they have affinity for the categories Power Tools/Drills and Power Tools/Saws and for the brands Brandix and Wakita, Smart Discovery might recommend them Brandix Drills, Brandix Saws, Wakita Drills, and Wakita Saws, among other suggestions, sorted by the visitor's affinities and overall product popularity. If the visitor selects Wakita Drills, the browser opens a search results page listing the best matches for products that belong to the category Power Tools/Drills and whose brand is Wakita.

Figure: Smart Discovery experience on a retail site (click to enlarge)

For more information about Smart Discovery, see:

Frosmo Search & Smart Discovery

Smart Discovery is built on Frosmo Search and uses the same search results page as Instant Search.

You can think of Instant Search and Smart Discovery as two sides of the same search experience coin:

• Instant Search: The visitor actively searches for items by trying out different search terms. The visitor does most of the work. This is a good solution when the visitor knows what they want and what terms to use, or when it's easy and convenient for them to type in search terms, such as on a desktop or laptop computer.
• Smart Discovery: The Frosmo Platform actively recommends the visitor relevant search terms (Smart Discovery suggestions). The platform does most of the work. This is a good solution when the visitor does not quite know what they want or what terms to use, when they are looking for ideas and options, or when it's difficult or inconvenient for them to type in search terms, such as on a mobile device.

Why use Smart Discovery?

Using site search with Smart Discovery has several advantages:

• Boost findability and discovery. By doing the searching for them, Smart Discovery allows visitors to more effectively find and discover items that are relevant to them in their current customer journey phase.
• Reduce bounce rate while boosting conversion. Keep visitors on your site and drive them towards conversion by helping them to effortlessly find and purchase relevant items, resulting in increased average order value for the site.
• Reduce choice overload. On sites where a visitor faces an abundance of choices, Smart Discovery helps the visitor navigate those choices by bundling them into more manageable chunks: by reducing a large number of items into relevant groups of items.
• Search visually. Selecting from visually represented search term suggestions makes for a faster and more accessible search experience than trying out different search terms in a search box, especially when on a mobile device.

Smart Discovery on the page

The personalized selection of recommended searches that a visitor sees on the page is called a Smart Discovery. Smart Discoveries work like recommendations, but instead of items, they recommend groups of items, where each group is really a search query for those items, a Smart Discovery suggestion. The suggestions are based on a specific item attribute combination, such as brand + type or color + type, resulting in suggestions like Nike Shoes or White Shoes. All discoveries for a site use the same attribute combination.

The actual set of suggestions that an individual visitor sees in a Smart Discovery depends on:

• Affinity: The platform sorts the suggestions based on the visitor's affinities. For example, if the visitor has a high affinity for the category Fashion/Clothes and a low affinity for the category Fashion/Shoes, the platform will rank a suggestion for Orange Clothes higher than a suggestion for Orange Shoes. If the affinities were reversed, the platform would rank a suggestion for Orange Shoes higher than a suggestion for Orange Clothes.
• Item popularity: The platform generates and sorts suggestions based on the most popular items on a site, where popularity is based on the number of conversions or views. For example, if skirts are among the most popular items on a site, while headbands are among the least popular, the platform will generate plenty of suggestions for skirts but only a few or even none for headbands.
• Page type: If the visitor is on the home page, the Smart Discovery displays suggestions for the entire site. If the visitor is on a category page, the discovery only displays suggestions relevant to that category. For example, if the visitor is browsing the Fashion category page, the discovery will only include suggestions for items that belong to the category Fashion or to one of its subcategories, such as Fashion/Shoes. If the visitor navigated to the Fashion/Shoes category page, the discovery would only include suggestions for the category Fashion/Shoes or for one of its subcategories, such as Fashion/Shoes/Sneakers.

The following figure shows the same Smart Discovery as displayed to two different visitors who are browsing the same category page on a retail site. Visitor 1 has an affinity for clothes and the colors orange, red, and blue , while visitor 2 has an affinity for shoes and the colors red, black, and orange. The different affinities result in the Smart Discovery displaying two very different sets of suggestions.

Figure: Same Smart Discovery displayed to visitors with different affinities

You typically have one Smart Discovery per page.

Components of a Smart Discovery

A Smart Discovery is the end product of multiple Frosmo components working together. The following figure shows three components coming together on a page to form a Smart Discovery slider.

Figure: Components of a Smart Discovery coming together on the page

A Smart Discovery is the end product of the following components:

• Smart Discovery data generated by the Frosmo Platform for the discovery. The data consists of the details of one or more Smart Discovery suggestions. For each suggestion, the details include information such as display label and the item attribute combination that defines the suggestion. The suggestions are in descending order of rank, with the most relevant suggestion ranked highest.

• Template for creating the web page element for the Smart Discovery. The template defines how the discovery is displayed on the page. The template must:

  • Define the framing element for the discovery. This is the static part of the discovery: the HTML, CSS, and JavaScript that together define how the discovery looks and behaves on the page.
  • Fetch the discovery data, and populate the element with that data. This is the dynamically generated content of the discovery: the suggestions.

  The static and dynamic parts together create the final element as displayed on the page.

• Modification for displaying the Smart Discovery on the page. The modification must:
  • Use the template for its content.
  • Set the content options defined in the template, if any.
• Placement for determining where the modification is placed on the site: on which web pages and where on those pages.
• Segments and affinity groups (optional) for displaying the modification only to a specific subset of visitors. If you want to display the Smart Discovery to all visitors, do not assign the modification to any segments or affinity groups.

How Smart Discovery works

Learn how Smart Discovery works under the hood:

Supported attributes

The platform can generate Smart Discovery suggestions based on any string attribute tracked for the site by Frosmo Search.

The platform can generate Smart Discovery suggestions based on up to 2 attributes. The attributes are set at site level, meaning all discoveries for a given site use the same attribute combination for their suggestions.

The exact attribute setup for a site is always separately planned and agreed with you.

Supported page types

The platform supports Smart Discovery for the following page types:

• Category
• Home

Smart Discovery workflow

Smart Discovery works with a site as follows:

1. The platform generates the Smart Discovery data for the site:

   • The platform generates a baseline discovery for the home page.
   • The platform generates a baseline discovery for each category tracked for the site by Frosmo Search. For example, if the site has the categories Power Tools, Power Tools/Drills, and Power Tools/Saws, the platform generates a single baseline discovery for each.
   • The platform generates each baseline discovery based on (a) the attribute combination defined for the site and (b) the most popular items in the discovery's category or, for the home page discovery, on the site as a whole. For example, if the site uses the attribute combination brand + type, and if the most popular items in the category Power Tools/Saws belong to the brands Brandix, Cakita, and Wakita, the platform will generate the following suggestions for the Power Tools/Saws discovery: Brandix Saws, Cakita Saws, and Wakita Saws.
2. On the site, a visitor navigates to a page that contains a Smart Discovery.
3. The platform displays the Smart Discovery on the page:
   1. The platform retrieves the data for the discovery using the Smart Discovery API. For example, if the visitor navigated to the Fashion/Shoes category page, the platform retrieves the data for the Fashion/Shoes discovery. The platform also sorts the suggestions in the data based on the visitor's affinities, turning the baseline discovery into a personalized discovery.
   2. The platform builds and renders the discovery element based on the sorted suggestions and using the template, modification, and placement defined for the discovery.
4. The visitor clicks a suggestion in the Smart Discovery.
5. The platform displays the results for the selected search:
   1. The platform redirects the visitor to the search results page.
   2. The platform retrieves the search results using the Search API.
   3. The platform renders the search results on the search results page.

Figure: Smart Discovery workflow (click to enlarge)

Where to go next

• Learn how to create Smart Discoveries.
• Learn how to view the Smart Discovery data generated for a site.
• Learn from a practical example of creating a Smart Discovery for category pages.
• If you're a developer, learn how to retrieve Smart Discovery data with the Smart Discovery API.