Central Online, the e-commerce arm of Thai retailer Central Department Store, has implemented Algolia’s AI Search platform to improve how customers navigate its online catalogue.
The shift to Algolia’s platform is part of Central Department Store’s efforts to provide relevant search experiences for its online shoppers.
As part of its digital overhaul, which involves moving to Adobe Experience Manager and Adobe Commerce, Central Online has transitioned from Elasticsearch to Algolia’s AI Search platform to support search, browsing and product discovery across its large catalogue.
Central Online implemented Algolia’s search, browse and product carousels features, along with tools such as instantsearch, query suggestions, dynamic re-ranking, rules and dynamic filters to enhance user interactions on the platform.
Central Online search and onsite optimisation head Kunapas Thongpiam stated: “We’re always striving to push the boundaries of agility and innovation for our customers; this quest led us to Algolia. Customers can now search through millions of our products and find what they love in milliseconds, regardless of search queries or language.
“Before using Algolia’s dynamic re-ranking, our search results were repetitive and primarily based on price. Now we have transformed our search experience, offering highly relevant results that we could never achieve manually.
“Importantly, we have found the Algolia AI Search platform to be far more user-friendly for a non-tech person or a business unit — what used to take us hours and days is now a simple five-minute set-up.”
Central Department Store also collaborated with Algolia to address the challenge of processing Thai language search queries, which often lack spaces between words.
Using Algolia’s natural language processing (NLP) capabilities, Central Online has improved the accuracy and relevance of Thai search queries through tokenisation.
Algolia field operations president Michelle Adams stated: “Central Group’s commitment to innovation and exceptional customer experiences aligns perfectly with Algolia’s mission.
“We’re proud to be their AI search platform of choice and excited to see how our collaboration continues to elevate their e-commerce strategy.”
