Articles on: Quizell Smart Search & Menu

Setting Up AI Search

Introduction

AI Search turns your Shopify store's search bar into a smart shopping assistant — understanding natural language, forgiving typos, and surfacing the right products fast. This guide covers everything that controls how search works and what it returns: syncing your catalog, choosing search types, tuning relevance, curating results, and configuring suggestions.

(Changing how the search bar looks is covered separately in Customizing Your Search Bar.)

AI Search is part of Quizell Smart Search & Menu, a separate Shopify app from Quizell. If you're new here, start with What Is Quizell Smart Search & Menu?

Where to find it

In your Shopify admin, open Apps → Quizell Smart Search & Menu
Select Search in the left menu

Step 1: Sync your catalog

Before search can return accurate results, the app needs an up-to-date copy of your products and collections.

In the Manual Sync section, click Sync Now

Run a sync whenever you've made significant catalog changes (added, removed, or substantially edited products) and want them reflected in search right away.

Step 2: Choose your search types

Under Search types enabled, toggle the matching styles you want:

Fuzzy Search — finds matches similar to a query, including typos, misspellings, and partial hits. Great for catching "snekers" → "sneakers."
AI Contextual Search — a smart search bar that understands natural language, turning your search bar into a shopping assistant (e.g., "warm jacket for winter"). Available on the Pro plan.

Step 3: Set your search relevance

The Properties Search Relevance section controls which product properties the search algorithm considers, and how much each matters.

Drag a property up or down to set its priority — higher means more weight in results.
Check or uncheck a property to include or exclude it from the algorithm.

Available properties include Title, Vendor, Product Type, Product Tag, Product Option, Description, Collection Title, and SKU.

For most stores, Title and Product Type belong near the top; properties like SKU or Vendor are often only worth including if customers actually search by them.

Step 4: Curate results with Recommendations and Redirects

The Recommendations and Redirects section lets you take manual control of what shoppers see. Click into each to configure:

Pin Products — list specific products at the top of search for a given keyword (e.g., always show your hero product for "gift").
List Synonyms — map related terms so a search returns more relevant results (e.g., show T-shirts, Shirts, and Long sleeves when a visitor types "Polo").
Add Redirects — send a query straight to a page instead of search results (e.g., redirect "summer" to your Summer collection).

Step 5: Configure suggestions

Two toggles control what shoppers see in helpful edge cases:

No result suggestions display — shows suggestions when the widget returns no results for a query. Available on the Pro plan.
Zero characters typed suggestions display — shows suggestions the moment a visitor opens search, before they've typed anything. Available on the Pro plan.

That's it!

Your AI Search is now configured to match how your customers actually search. 🎉

Best practices

Sync after catalog changes so search reflects your current products.
Order relevance to match shopper behavior — Title usually belongs first; include SKU or Vendor only if customers search those.
Use synonyms for jargon and category language your customers use but your product titles don't.
Use redirects for campaigns and collections so high-intent searches land on the right page instantly.
Turn on AI Contextual Search if customers search in natural language rather than keywords.

Important notes

AI Contextual Search, no-result suggestions, and zero-character suggestions are Pro features. See Analytics & Plans for what each plan includes.
This page controls how search behaves. To change how the search bar looks (colors, tabs, text), use the Search Bar Editor — see Customizing Your Search Bar.
Re-run Sync Now after adding or removing products so they appear (or stop appearing) in results.

Troubleshooting

New products aren't showing in search

Run Manual Sync → Sync Now, then search again.

Search misses typos and misspellings

Enable Fuzzy Search under Search types.

Natural-language queries aren't understood

Enable AI Contextual Search (Pro plan).

A property doesn't seem to affect results

Confirm it's checked (included) in Properties Search Relevance, and drag it higher to give it more weight.

What's next?

With search configured, customize the bar's appearance next so it matches your store.

Updated on: 10/06/2026

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