West Lafayette, Indiana - Imaginestics LLC, whose visual search engine called VizSeek helps people find industrial products faster and more accurately than conventional search engines, has launched a new software-as-a-service platform for company industrial product catalogs.
The new visual search engine allows companies to upload their product catalogs to the VizSeek platform and make them searchable by photo, providing an efficient way for customers or employees to find the product they need.
"For a product company, search engines are a lifeline between their customers and their products. Browsing through categories while searching with words is effective only for customers who speak the same language, understand the company's terminology or already know the specific name or model number they need," said Jamie Tan, Imaginestics CEO and co-founder. "Companies that subscribe to our service can upload their products or 3-D models to our servers and then make the visual search engine available to their customers or employees."
Tan said the cloud-based platform makes visual search affordable and technically feasible for a wide range of products, creating an easier selling process for both the buyer and the seller.
"With smartphones today, almost everyone has access to a camera in their pockets, so all customers have to do is upload an image of the product they need and search," he said. "If a buyer sends a photo of the product, it is just as easy for a customer service agent to quickly search and identify the product or locate warranty or maintenance information."
Tan said the search engine also is applicable for companies that use 3-D printing in their manufacturing process.
"A company with a database of 3-D models could make visual search available to their customers using just a photo or a 3-D model as input," Tan said. "Companies that work in engineering design could use visual search to make their 3-D models or CAD drawings easier to find and power their design re-use efforts, speed up the design process, reduce part number proliferation and reduce time to produce quotes."
Tan said Imaginestics' new interface allows a better customer experience.
"The platform has an easy-to-use interface and desktop app for syncing and maintaining data, which means companies can put visual search in place quickly with minimal infrastructure and time and resource investment. If a company has an existing product catalog it will also have a quick implementation process," he said. "We can handle searching both images and 3-D models, which can be useful for a wide array of companies that may have one or both types of data."
Imaginestics offers a basic level service where companies can upload their products to the public visual search engine and a premium level service in which companies receive a dedicated branded site on the VizSeek platform for only their products or designs to appear. Premium subscribers can also use VizSeek APIs to allow use of the visual search capabilities on their own websites or mobile apps.
