Glossary

Plain-English definitions of every term you'll see in CartAmplify — and why each one matters for your store.

Attribution token#

A small identifier returned in every search, browse, and recommendation response. Your storefront passes it through subsequent events so CartAmplify can credit the originating surface for any eventual purchase.

Why it matters: Without attribution tokens, your dashboard can’t tell you which widgets actually drove revenue. Platform plugins thread these automatically; custom integrations need to handle this.

Browse#

A request to CartAmplify for a personalized category page — “given this visitor and this category, what’s the best order to show them?” The category-page equivalent of search.

Why it matters: Category pages are usually a store’s largest traffic source after the homepage. Smart Browse turns them from static lists into per-visitor experiences. (Growth+ tier.)

Catalog#

CartAmplify’s copy of your products. Synced from your platform via plugin or pushed via the API. Keyed by product ID + language.

Why it matters: The richer your catalog (titles, categories, attributes), the better every other feature works.

Catalog sync#

The process of getting your products into CartAmplify. Either continuous (platform plugins) or via bulk API calls.

Why it matters: A stale or incomplete catalog leads to missing products in search, recommendations that suggest things you don’t sell, and broken analytics.

Cold start#

The phase before personalization activates — typically the first week or two after install, while CartAmplify collects shopper events. Results during cold start use the catalog and overall popularity instead of per-visitor signals.

Why it matters: Cold start is normal and temporary. If you want to skip it, bulk-import historical events.

Conversion rate#

Of the shoppers who clicked a search result, browsed a category, or clicked a recommendation, what percentage ultimately purchased. Calculated per surface and per widget in the dashboard.

Why it matters: Conversion rate × traffic × average order value = revenue. CartAmplify lifts conversion by surfacing better products; if conversion isn’t moving, the issue is usually downstream (product page, checkout).

CTR (click-through rate)#

The percentage of times a surface (search results, recommendation widget, category page) led to at least one product click.

Why it matters: High CTR means your shoppers find the surface relevant. Low CTR means the widget is in the wrong place or the wrong type for that page.

Event#

A single shopper action — viewed a product, added to cart, searched, purchased. Events are CartAmplify’s view of what’s happening on your store.

Why it matters: Events drive personalization, analytics, and the “10,000-event threshold” that activates per-language personalization.

Facet#

A filter sidebar option on a search results or category page — brand, color, size, price range, custom attribute.

Why it matters: Facets are how shoppers narrow large result sets. CartAmplify generates them automatically from your catalog attributes.

Language#

A locale your store sells in, identified by a two-letter code (en, fr, es, it, de…). Every product, event, widget, and personalization model in CartAmplify is scoped to a language.

Why it matters: Each language trains its own personalization model — independently — which is why adding a language is a meaningful decision, not a cosmetic one.

Merchandising rule#

A manual override that pins, boosts, or excludes specific products for specific queries or categories. Available on Amplify and Enterprise tiers.

Why it matters: When you need to override the AI — for a promotion, a strategic push, or a known issue — merchandising rules give you the lever.

Model#

The personalization model trained for a given language. Each language has its own. Trains automatically once the language crosses the 10,000-event threshold and retrains as data grows.

Why it matters: When the dashboard says a language is “personalized”, it means a trained model is serving results. Before that, it’s “cold start.”

Optimization goal#

What a recommendation widget tries to maximize: click-through rate, conversion rate, or revenue per impression. Configured per widget (Growth+).

Why it matters: Different goals produce different orderings. “Revenue” can favor higher-priced items; “CTR” can favor lower-priced impulse items. Pick the goal that matches the widget’s business purpose.

Personalization#

The reshaping of search results, category pages, and recommendations based on each individual shopper’s history.

Why it matters: It’s the difference between every visitor seeing the same store and each one seeing a store tailored to them.

Recommendation widget#

A placement on your store that shows a small set of products — “Similar items”, “Recommended for you”, “Frequently bought together”, etc. CartAmplify supports five types, each suited to different surfaces.

Why it matters: Recommendations are the easiest way to lift average order value and conversion. Each widget you add to a previously empty surface is a new revenue opportunity.

Revenue per impression (RPI)#

The average revenue a widget generates per time it shows. The ultimate ranking metric for comparing widgets.

Why it matters: A widget with lower CTR but higher AOV can outperform a higher-CTR widget. RPI tells the truth.

A request to CartAmplify with a text query — “blue jeans”, “wireless earphones” — that returns ranked, personalized product results.

Why it matters: Search is often the highest-intent traffic on a store. Improving search results lifts conversion more than almost any other change.

Session#

A continuous block of activity by a single visitor. CartAmplify uses session context (the pages a shopper just viewed, what they just added to cart) as real-time signal alongside the longer-term personalization model.

Why it matters: Session signals are what make CartAmplify feel “instant” — a shopper who just looked at blue dresses sees blue products climb in the next category page immediately, before any model retrains.

Tier#

Your subscription plan: Starter, Growth, Amplify, or Enterprise. Each tier has different limits (products, monthly requests, widgets) and feature access (Browse, certain widget types, merchandising rules, analytics depth).

Why it matters: The tier table is the cheat sheet for what’s enabled on your account. See Pricing for the full breakdown.

User ID (userId)#

An optional identifier you can attach to events when a shopper logs into your store. Distinct from visitor ID.

Why it matters: When a logged-in shopper visits from a different device, sending the same user ID lets CartAmplify unify their behavior across devices — so they get personalized results that reflect their full history, not just the current device.

Visitor ID (visitorId)#

An anonymous identifier for each shopper, typically stored in a cookie or localStorage. Required on every event and every search/browse/recommendation request.

Why it matters: Visitor ID is how CartAmplify ties a shopper’s actions together across pages and sessions. Without a persistent visitor ID, every page view looks like a different person to the personalization model.

Widget#

A placement on your store powered by CartAmplify — the search bar, a category page’s product grid, a recommendation strip. Every widget has a unique widgetId you reference in API calls and in your storefront integration.

Why it matters: Widgets are the unit you create, configure, and analyze. Your tier limits how many widgets you can have active at once.

Zero-result query#

A search query that returned no products. Listed in Search AI (in the dashboard sidebar, under AI Features).

Why it matters: Every zero-result query is a shopper who left without finding what they wanted. Reviewing this list weekly and adding synonyms recovers bounced traffic — one of the highest-ROI habits in running a CartAmplify-powered store.

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