Searchanise Search & Filter

I've been using the product for years. Recently they "upgraded" their plans and unless you change to a new plan they'll delete your account. I hate when companies force you into upgrades that you don't need. I mean it's only $77 a year increase but it's a dirty practice that all the app developers seem to be doing now. I'll stay with it for now but might look for other options.

App is really useful in providing a better search experience for my customers. From the analytics, I'm able to see what my customers are searching for (and not getting results), as well as what they are searching for using the wrong spelling and how Smart Search helps to suggest relevant results. This wasn't possible without the app.

Besides the awesome functionality, I have to say that the customer support is amazing. I asked them to try and make the default search page look more like my theme's collection page, and they were instantly on it, making numerous changes to perfect the look and feel through CSS customisations. The team didn't get it right the first time (or the second time), but there was no hesitation in working on the feedback I gave them. To me, that's going above and beyond what anyone would expect, and so kudos to the team.

I'd definitely recommend Smart Search and Instant Search to other shop owners.

Review update: I'd still recommend the app for the search function. However, getting the developers to help fix the look and feel of the search page has been incredibly frustrating. Sure, they have been willing to help, but they have not been able to fix the issues despite repeated explanations. My search page only looks 'satisfactory' on a full-screen browser, and once I resize the browser, the responsiveness doesn't work and images start to overlap the text, labels are out of place and spacing is inconsistent. Unfortunately, the customer service doesn't seem to acknowledge or understand the issue and the problems persist after months of trying.

If you have your own CSS capabilities, by all means this is a good app. If you need to rely on their developers to perfect the look and feel, my experience is that it's going to be a challenge.

EDIT (July 2019): Finally the Searchanise team have started thinking about variants. Still very buggy (e.g. has lost the ability to show the most relevant variant, treats single-variant products as multi-variant, new data-variant-sku attribute doesn't update properly, and some filters have broken as part of the update), and still doesn't link to the correct variant, but a step in the right direction.

Good relevance algorithm and speedy response but crucial variant information is missing from results. This means that customers might think e.g. a product only comes in one colour or the most expensive size. Searches for specific option values (e.g. 'Blue shoes') will return the correct image but won't link to the pictured variant, and there is not enough information returned in the code to amend the hrefs after the event (without calling the Shopify AJAX API for every returned result = waaaaay too slow).

I've had to introduce a handful of JS hacks for other things that *can* be fixed this way, but repeated requests from me for small but significant improvements have been ignored.

Don't get me wrong, for the money this is definitely worthwhile - much cheaper and easier than indexing your own inventory (especially large catalogues like ours), and obviously a hell of a lot better than Shopify's in-built system, just be prepared to spend a fair amount of time faffing with code to get it looking and acting as you want. And don't expect any help from these guys - they never reply to emails.

I'll up this to 5 stars if the developers cater for products with variants!

Edit May 11 2018
So they reached out to me a little over a week ago after the review was posted, and it took another full week for them to respond to my reply, then I spoke with them on the phone and discussed all issues,

they told me i was correct about the search on mobile and that by tomorrow (which is today) it will be fixed, and as far as integrating with shopperapproved who is the only reasonable priced google approved review aggragator they will need the API to get that done,

So we got them all that information and had shopperapproveds team and them in one email and shopper approved replied with all instructions, but they just ignored those emails! which is amazong, here we have a filter that integrates with 4 review apps, of which only one YOPTO is approved for google, and they cost a min of $10000 a year, and here we have shopperapproved, which only cost around $3000 a year, willing to work with them and make it work and they ignore it completely,

you guys have a great search and filter app PLEASE make it even better by integrating with shopperapproved.

I upgraded to 3 stars because they fixed the bug and now mobile works like a bless, the filters are amazing,

Part 1 the product,
the product is probably a 3 star, and here is why,

for search on mobile it does not work as it should, the filters disappear before you can choose a filter. so there alone you loose half or more of the visitors that cannot use the filters,

for desktop it works great, that is why it gets 3 stars on filters,

Part 2 navigation

Navigation on the other hand could of been a good product if they just let you display product ratings from anyone, and they done, they have only 4 product review system they integrate, and of those 4 only 1 is an approved google review aggregator, and that is yopto and they cost a minimum of 10K a year which is above almost any small business budget,

when asked if we can integrate to another company we use their answer was only with enterprise, and the price would be $269 a month when asked why on the site it shows $132 a month for enterprise? they answered because we have modifications, which makes no sense, that is a one time change not a monthly!

when we replied saying we are seriously considering their enterprise version and we would like to talk to someone on the phone their reply was, WE DO NOT OFFER PHONE SUPPORT! are you serious? we are talking about spending with you 1000's and upgrading to ENTERPRISE and you have no phone support? that is ridiculous!

all in all, if you do not care of product reviews then use it, if you care about product reviews and you need your product reviews to be submitted to google, and be displayed on the category pages, then look for something else,

Edit: While support is quick to confirm a ticket has been created, they are backed up more often than not. This makes it difficult to receive assistance on high priority needs and leads to a standstill on optimizing the app.

Previously, I would have given this app 3.5 to 4 stars. However, after putting in months of work installing and configuring it, Searchanise increased the price of our plan by 400%. That's right: 400%. The exorbitant and abrupt price change feels like a bait and switch. Searchanise only gave a week's notice of the price change. Changing search apps (or changing a theme to avoid the need for a search app) is not something that can be accomplished in a week or so. Accordingly, we felt like Searchanise was extorting us with the abrupt price change. They were essentially saying: "Pay 400% more or we'll break your webstore". Moreover, the app has significant problems with its search algorithm, which is the key feature we required from it. The Searchanise algorithm has difficulty identifying variations on the same word. For example, we sell pom poms as a craft item. But the app is not able to recognize variations on that term. If a customer searches for pompom, pom pom, pom-pom, pompoms or pom-poms, the app will not return search results that include items containing the term "pom poms". The app includes a synonym function that purports to allow you to manually define related terms to correct deficiencies in the algorithm. Manual programming should not be required for a search algorithm to treat such similar terms as synonyms. Moreover, the synonym function in the app does not work properly. We have tried at length to use the synonyms function to resolve problems with the app's search algorithm, but the synonym function produces undesirable, inconsistent and unpredictable results. It changes the order and contents of search results in really unpredictable ways. We have read all the literature that Searchanise has provided on the synonym function, so we are aware of all the guidance on its use. Despite this, we have largely had to discontinue using it because it produces such inconsistent and unpredictable results. We have had to resort to using tags and revising our product descriptions to try to capture common variations on search terms to make up for shortcomings in the app's algorithm. That is very time consuming and should not be required. The fact that the app has difficulty recognizing the singular and plural form of words as synonyms is particularly problematic (eg. pompom and pompoms). So, before considering using this app, beware of its functionality shortcomings and the risk of exorbitant price increases instituted on short notice after you have spent days, months or years trying to configure the app.

Great app, we sell over 8000 wholesale lines on http://www.wholesale247.co.uk and needed a way to help our buyers select items from Home & Garden, Stationary, Toys, DIY etc, this has been a perfect app for us

The app overall is quite good, but the recent rate hike is unfortunate & we're looking for a replacement. For us, the monthly price more than doubled. $19/mo minimum for site search is just asking too much.

It's still a nice alternative to improve the abysmal default search of Shopify at a great price. But how they handle plans are... not good. Not good at all. This is the second time we've been prevented from using the app because we need to change plans. The last time, we had added a few more products and gone over the limit - fair. But we had paid yearly in the past on a lower plan, and had to keep paying yearly and whatnot. This time around, we had to upgrade our plan after getting Plus. And it seems to only be annual options available, which sucks since we are now planning to leave Searchanise in favor of more customizeable and accurate alternatives. Searchanise has started to slow our site a bit, search results can be weird, and the look and feel doesn't feel native to our store at all, even with CSS. We now need a faster option with more customizeability, and I refuse to upgrade to a more expensive plan on an annual basis to be able to export our data and settings. New Conclusion: A nice and affordable upgrade to the default Search of Shopify with some nice advanced functionality at the given price point, but not for enterprises. Search and navigation are some of the most important aspects of an ecommerce store, and is worth paying for. *Old review below*
Exceptional app. Probably one of my favorite apps in Shopify so far. Very versatile, works right off the bat, easy to customize, and works and looks great. Bonus for great stats too! I had a quick question when tinkering with it in the weekend, and the support team quickly helped me sort things out. There's no secret the default search in Shopify sucks, and this app takes it right to the opposite and makes it amazing instead. A must-have app for any serious webshop with a fair share of products. Only potential drawback I would say, is that I cannot access the html to make the product view look and feel completely like the rest of our store.

I like the app, but we had a significant drop in speed on our shop, from 28 to 19, due to this app. I wrote to you about this to find out if there are any solutions, but I still haven't had an answer. If there is no improvement, I will have to delete the app.