The challenge

Before partnering with Algolia, Under Armour relied on an in-house, open source site search platform. A specific set of members on the development team built the platform from the ground up, so, naturally, they became the search platform’s subject matter experts. 

But when some of the core members of the platform pursued other roles within the company, the product team needed a solution for adapting to the emerging search trends in real time. After a period of vetting different solutions in line with Under Armour’s exceptional level of service, Algolia was selected as the search vendor for their North America sites.

The solution

Algolia’s user-friendly platform, dedicated customer support, and cutting-edge search & discovery capabilities

Armed with an intuitive, streamlined search-as-aservice platform in Algolia, Under Armour could now modify and optimize their search & discovery experience without touching any code or having to work directly with developers. Under Armour also received immediate support and feedback from Algolia’s customer success team whenever they had any problems or new ideas, which was much more consistent and reliable. 

Out of all the product features Under Armour tested, their favorite was Type-Ahead. Type-Ahead dynamically predicts users’ search intent and returns the most relevant results after each of their keystrokes, allowing Under Armour to provide near-instant search results to their website visitors to support a fast, relevant and engaging experience. 

To make sure their search results were just as relevant as they were fast, Under Armour used Algolia’s Query Rules feature to customize their rankings based off their products’ popularity, newness, and availability. With this newfound ability to modify their search results, Under Armour was able to test which products they thought their customers wanted and refine their rankings based on the experiment’s outcome. 

Another feature Under Armour used to improve their relevancy was Algolia’s Analytics Dashboard. With the Analytics Dashboard, Under Armour was able to uncover the most common queries that returned no results, a reason why people bounce from Under Armour’s website. This insight helped Under Armour return relevant search results for these types of queries and, in turn, provide a better search experience while decreasing bounce rates.

The result

Under Armour converts at a higher rate on search than any other brand in the sports apparel industry

After A/B testing Algolia against their in-house, open source site search platform, Under Armour discovered that their engagement and conversion rates vastly increased. 

After implementing Algolia in 2017, Under Armour consistently sees a 35% higher conversion rate for customers who utilize the search feature. Their B2B website has also chosen Algolia as their solution to return fast, relevant, and personalized search results.