Develop a more relevant product offering by analyzing search behavior

Business

Viapresse is France's number 1 online retailer of print and digital press, with over 800 newspapers and magazines, and more than 2,000 subscription offers.

Requirements

Optimize the relevance of the magazine offer on the main site and white-label partners by analyzing users' search behavior and interest in product listings. The digital team also wants to better understand which magazines or topics seem most interesting to prospects.

Objectives

• Identify the magazine categories that are most in demand, but for which there is a shortage of supply

• Identify the magazines or subjects that seem to generate the most interest

Proposed solution

• Establish a definition of interest in a product. Here the % of times a magazine is selected from a list over the number of times it is displayed to a user.

• Define search attributes such as filters, search terms, categories, etc. to understand the performance of the results displayed. In other words, the selection rate of the search results displayed.

• Collect keyword search success rates. That is, the % of times a magazine is selected in a list of search results.

Implementation

Architecture

• Update data collection in the data layer view_item and select_item as well as the associated parameters required for more detailed analysis.

• Data collection in GA4

• Exporting data to BigQuery

• Creation of a tool in Looker Studio to explore insights

Example of a data layer update :

dataLayer.push({ ecommerce: null });  // Clear the previous ecommerce object.
dataLayer.push({
  event: 'view_item_list',
  list: {
    category: 'sport',
    subcategory: 'running',
  },
  ecommerce: {
    item_list_name: 'sportswear list',
    items: [
      {
        item_id: '98765',
        item_name: 'running shoes',
        discount: 10.00,
        index: 1,
        item_brand: 'nike',
        item_category: 'sport',
        item_category2: 'running',
        item_category3: 'footwear',
        price: 79.99,
      },
      {
        item_id: '98766',
        item_name: 'running shorts',
        discount: 5.00,
        index: 2,
        item_brand: 'adidas',
        item_category: 'sport',
        item_category2: 'running',
        item_category3: 'apparel',
        price: 29.99,
      },
    ],
  },
});

⚠️ Important consideration : Trigger print events for products that appear in the viewport (visitor screen) to reflect user experience and not skew results.

Project duration

The project took two weeks in total. A few extra recipes were needed to check the white marks and adjust the data collected to reflect the user experience.

Results

• The team responsible for the offer may seek new partnerships to propose highly sought-after magazines that are not yet available or too few options on the Viapresse site.

• The digital team can study search behavior and preferences according to the time of year.

Search results performance

Further information

1. Anticipate inventory levels based on demand and search behavior over the period.

2. Integrate keywords from Search Console and Google Trends to identify prospects' expectations in relation to the magazine offer on the site, but also to detect new trends and declining topics.