Thanx Media (IRCE booth 731), a leading provider of integrated solutions for online retailers and media companies, announced today that its client, Nebraska Furniture Mart, has seen an double-digit percentage increase in sales since deploying Thanx Media’s Endeca site search and merchandising solution on its online store. The deployment was a key part of a series of recent investments in retailer’s online channel and was a central piece of a recent and on-going website redesign. Nebraska Furniture Mart has also tapped the solution’s Merchandising Workbench tool suite, empowering marketers to quickly self-create new localized content and monetize areas of the site without the need for IT or development cycles. As a result, Nebraska Furniture Mart’s eCommerce team can boost sales and sponsorship revenue while eliminating dependencies on valuable technical resources.

Nebraska Furniture Mart’s site search and merchandising approach offers a cutting-edge example of new applications of ‘searchandising’ – applications that go above and beyond the up-sell, cross-sell and related-products approaches synonymous with search-based merchandising tools. Two examples of the retailers approach include localized content creation and display, as well as brand-specific, search-triggered landing pages.

“The merchandising tools available with the Endeca solution open up a wealth of new tactics we can apply to our multi-channel strategy, and really set it apart from other solutions on the market,” said Jeffrey Douglas, Internet Marketing Manager at Nebraska Furniture Mart. “We’re now evolving and updating aspects of the shopping experience that we never would have attempted in the past, either because they would have been cost or resource prohibitive.”

For example, Nebraska Furniture Mart operates stores in Omaha, Des Moines, and Kansas City. Departments and product lines vary by location. Using the new tools, Douglas and his team created different elements of the online experience that would dynamically appear based on the location of the online shopper. If the shopper is accessing the site from Kansas City market – where the retailer features a high-end design business – distinct products and design services are automatically displayed and prominently promoted on the website.

Another example includes the creation and monetization of brand-themed zones of the online store. Nebraska Furniture Mart’s brick-and-mortar stores feature a Sony Store boutique – a branded store-within-a-store. Using the Endeca Merchandising Workbench, the retailer has been able to create a similarly branded section of the site, thus introducing new means of monetizing virtual floor space in a way that mirrors proven offline merchandising approaches.

“Thanx Media lowered the barrier to entry for adopting and deploying state-of-the-art software without using up our limited IT resources. And they proved to be a great partner in the process,” said Jeff Olson, Senior Programmer/Analyst at NFM. “When you combine best-in-class search with tools like Merchandising Workbench and Site Boost automated SEO, you empower the business while freeing up valuable technical resources to focus on improving other complementary aspects of the multi-channel shopping experience.”

Thanx Media offers an extensive range of Endeca-based offerings and services, including their SaaS Endeca On-Demand hosted site search solution and new Site Boost automated SEO.

“Nebraska Furniture Mart is among our most innovative clients, both in their use of merchandising control and their focus on building a consistent and differentiated multi-channel strategy,” said Paul Matker, CEO of Thanx Media. “Their unique approaches to localization and monetization illustrate the type of value that the Endeca platform can deliver above and beyond state-of-the-art search and navigation. Our goal is to make this technology accessible to an increasingly wide variety of multi-channel and eCommerce operations.”

About Nebraska Furniture Mart:
Nebraska Furniture Mart was founded in 1937 in Omaha, Nebraska by Rose Blumkin in the basement of her husband’s jewelry store with a $500 investment. In 1983, Warren Buffett purchased a majority interest in Nebraska Furniture Mart and made it part of the Berkshire Hathaway family of companies. In 2006 Nebraska Furniture Mart added the ability to buy online through its web site, nfm.com. Offering furniture, flooring, appliances, electronics and computers, Nebraska Furniture Mart just completed its 72nd year of consecutive growth. Nebraska Furniture Mart continues to maintain it’s tradition of selling cheap, telling the truth, and providing the greatest selection and service.

About Thanx Media:
Thanx Media is an enterprise solutions company that focuses on providing integrated solutions for B2C and B2B online retailers. The Deliver Commerce Framework, which identifies business problems and recommends the appropriate solutions, continues to fuel Thanx Media’s growth. These solutions are proven to improve conversion rates, increase revenue per order and boost customer retention. Thanx Media delivers the unexpected with best-of-breed products, industry best practices and a focused attention to business needs. Headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, USA, Thanx Media is a private company with North American operations.