Search engines continue to be a top resource for online shoppers. In fact, a recent study by Compete Online Shopper, a Web analytics company, found that 61 percent of online buyers use search engines when shopping around for products. The second most popular tool cited among these shoppers was coupon sites, with 35 percent of buyers saying they visit these. Retailer marketing e-mails came in third, with 29 percent of consumers reading them when deciding what to buy.

Buyer behavior does vary from niche to niche, but there’s no denying one thing: Search engines are very important to online shoppers.

This comes as no surprise to Auctiva Commerce Product Lead Chris Eckland.

“People utilize search engines, and Google Product Search in particular, to find the best deal on an item that they’re planning to buy,” he says. ”Often, this activity may be just to confirm a deal that’s available locally is in line with other offers, but in many cases a quick online search can reveal online stores with better deals or specials not available elsewhere.”

Search engines are consistently one of the largest traffic sources for Auctiva Commerce, and a primary way for buyers find Auctiva Commerce sellers, he adds.

With this in mind, Eckland reminds Auctiva Commerce sellers to map their products to Google by setting up and automating their feeds to Google Merchant Center. This keeps sellers’ inventory current on Google and makes items easier to find online.

“Our users say they’ve experienced increased sales once they mapped their Auctiva Commerce inventory to Google’s product taxonomy,” he continues. “Intuitively, it makes sense that buyers will be more likely to find items if they’re logically categorized.”

Google’s dominance among search engines is undeniable, says Auctiva Vice President Kevin Kinell. And its role in e-commerce, and the importance of feeds to Google Merchant Center (formerly Google Base), isn’t likely to decrease any time soon.

“Probably the most important thing that any seller setting up an e-commerce store can do is to make sure they’re getting their products into Google,” he says. “I don’t see Google’s importance diminishing, I see it increasing.”

Practical Ecommerce recently featured Auctiva Commerce as its Cart of the Week. You can read the article here.

Auctiva Commerce’s product manager, Chris Eckland, discussed the software in detail, and Auctiva Commerce user Bob Heitner talked about his experience with the shopping cart.

Bob, owner of Stuff Things and Goodies and Pattys Corner, said Auctiva Commerce’s ease of use, support, inventory management and SEO integration were among his favorite features.

“We’ve had stores on eBay, Amazon, Go Daddy, Go Daddy Marketplace and buyitsellit,” Bob notes. “Auctiva Commerce has the most functionality of all the products we have tried, and it’s the least expensive. It’s a fairly new product but has matured nicely over the last 10 months.”

More enhancements are in the works, says Eckland. “Auctiva Commerce is pleased to have been selected as the most recent Cart of the Week by Practical Ecommerce,” he adds.

Congratulations, Auctiva Commerce!