FAQs
Shop in your Local Town!
SearchMystreet.com can be called many things - a location based shopping search engine, a Web-to-store online service, or a cross-channel shopping experience.
But we like to think of what we do more simply - to bring life back into the local high streets we all grew up to love as children.
SearchMyStreet.com does this by leveraging the power of the Internet to drive more online customers doing web-based research or browsing on products through the doors of local bricks-and-mortar stores on their local high-street.
We're riding a trend in e-commerce - of shoppers gathering product information online but making their actual purchases in high street local stores.
Over the past decade the Internet has increasingly influenced the way in which we shop for and buy goods and products. Consider this: over 87% of European consumers have researched a product online in the past year.
But if you thought the Internet was an exclusively reserved shopping channel for online shoppers you should think again. New market research shows that 59% of UK online consumers research a product online, but choose to purchase it offline in a real bricks-and-mortar local store.
So how does SearchMyStreet work?
It's really simple and straightforward.
Local merchants provide us with their product and inventory data from offline and online sources which we organize into a searchable database. Online consumers use our simple site to search (by location) for particular products and the stores that carry them. You can either type in a product name or brand in free-form text and you type in our geographical location by postcode.
SearchMyStreet.com's sophisticated search engine then goes to work, scanning through our database to match the products to a list of local stores nearest to you that carry them, providing links to address and telephone details and UK maps to help you get there.
But that's not all. Consumers can also reserve products or compare products by price or proximity. In the future we're planning to add new mobile capabilities that let consumers shop using SearchMyStreet.com from mobile smart phones like Blackberry and Treo.
What are the benefits of local shopping search over other ecommerce sites and internet search engines for me as a consumer?
SearchMyStreet.com is different from online shopping search sites like Amazon or Kelkoo because it only shows you products sold in local stores. It's also different from yellow pages, which doesn't provide any details on specific products and services such as descriptions and pricing being offered by local stores.
SearchMyStreet.com provides a unique online service that allows consumers to search for products and brands available at local stores using the Internet or their mobile phone, and delivers the information necessary to make the best immediate purchasing decision.
For example, if you enter your postcode and "sony digital camera £200", our local shopping search engine finds the nearest local retailers that stocks this product at this price range and provides you with all the necessary details for you to get there and buy it.
What are the advantages for consumers?
So what are the advantages of using a local search engine? First, you avoid the uncertainty and delay of ordering something online - usually you have to wait several days before you get your hands on products and pay a fee for shipping and handling. Second, we direct you to the local store that stocks the product you want, thereby avoiding the frustration of physically traveling from store-to-store and wasting valuable time. And thirdly, you get to see the actual item you are going to buy before you pay for it, ensuring it is exactly what you want and that you are not getting a substitute, or a sub-standard item.
The best thing of all is that consumers benefit from the research they do online before buying and chose exactly when and where they want to buy it - no risk of online credit fraud, no waiting, no hassle.
What are the advantages for Merchants?
Listing their products on SearchMyStreet.com is a great way for local independent retailers to connect with local online shoppers. If a local stores' inventory is not online then they risk losing the hoards of potential customers researching products they stock because they cannot search for them online or easily find them locally.
SearchMyStreet also removes the cost involved in setting up and maintaining an ecommerce website. By handing us their product and inventory data we do all the heavy lifting for them.
And of course SearchMyStreet delivers to local stores potential customers who have already demonstrated an intent to purchase
Benefits for the Local Community?
There is much evidence to support the notion that thriving local high streets are key to sustaining vibrant local communities. If the current decline on our local high streets continues, then many smaller centres will cease to exist in their current form. This is likely to lead to a spiral of local economic and social decline. Conversely good quality local shopping facilities can 'sell' housing in an area, turning it into a desirable place to live and creating distinctiveness, Small local shops are an integral and valuable part of the UK economy in terms of providing employment, investment, diversity and innovation. Of the 280,000 shops that operate in the UK 85% of these have fewer than five employees.
Studies show that 50% of turnover from local retailers is typically returned to the local economy as compared to branches of large national retailers who may return as little as 5% to the local economy. Without the widespread existence of local businesses, money will be drained from local economies.
But the local high street ecosystem is extremely fragile. Small shops clustered together rely on each other to attract footfall to their location and create a dense network of interdependent producers, wholesalers and retailers. Typically a few dozen shops source from several hundred local and regional producers. The loss of a few small shops results in the increasing vulnerability of the local business network, and the dynamics driving critical footfall.
Local shoppers, who live in the community, therefore have a mutual interest with local merchants in shopping locally if they want their community to survive and prosper. SearchMyStreet is able to contribute to this endeavour by helping local stores convert online shoppers into local in-store buyers!
What's so special about SearchMyStreet.com?
We are the first, and currently the only, local shopping search service in the UK which delivers you:
Foot traffic - we reach local online shoppers via search engines to send them directly from the web to your local store.
Improved findability - by making your local store inventory searchable online, local customers can find you and your products more easily. They can even reserve products to pick up in person.
A Web Page for your Store that is customizable.
Individual Pages for All Your Products - with images, detailed descriptions, pricing, a map to your store, store hours, a link to your website (if you have one) and contact information.
Your Products and Store on Google, MSN, Yahoo etc and other online destinations where local customers are searching for your products.