Eds delivering-relevant-results

The EDS Approach to Delivering Relevant Results

Tito SierraDirector of Product Management, SearchEBSCO Information Services

Software as a Service

Agenda

• EBSCO’s Vision for Discovery• User Search Behavior• How EDS Relevance Ranking Works• Recent EDS Search Enhancements• Discussion / Q&A


EBSCO’s Vision for Discovery

Give users the results they want for every search in every context.


Every Search, Every Context

• Library user looking for a specific book in the catalogKnown-item catalog search

• Undergrad doing background research for a term paperExploratory topical search

• Faculty looking for a specific journal or article titlePublication and article citation search

• Researcher doing literature review on specialized topicSpecialized subject search

• Librarian supporting a reference interviewSupport for hybrid / advanced search strategies



• Library user looking for a specific book in the catalog– Known-item catalog search / book title search

• Undergrad doing background research for a term paper– Exploratory subject search / background research

• Faculty looking for a specific journal or article title– Known-item publication / article / citation search

• Researcher doing literature review on specialized topic– Specialized topic search / discipline specific search

• Librarian supporting a reference interview– Support for advanced search strategies



• Library user looking for a specific book in the catalog– Known-item catalog search / book title search

• Undergrad doing background research for a term paper– Exploratory subject search / background research

• Faculty looking for a specific journal or article title– Known-item publication / article / citation search

• Researcher doing literature review on specialized topic– Specialized topic search / discipline specific search

• Librarian supporting a reference interview– Support for advanced search strategies

Discovery services should support all of these search tasks, and many more.


User Search Behavior


Most Popular Searches in EDS

childhood obesityglobal warmingnursingsocial mediaeducationpsychologyebolaabortionobesityautismbullyinggun control

diabetesdomestic violenceleadershipnutritiondepressionmarketingchild abuseschizophreniafacebookdeath penaltymarijuanaclimate change

JSTORtestcancercommunicationstresstechnologyadhdethicsbusinessglobalizationimmigrationvideo games

human traffickingcyberbullyingtime managementpubmedbiologysocial workcapital punishmentmedical marijuanahomelessness

Sourced from one-week (Sept. 2014) sample of top search terms by marketFiltered to queries searched across at least 100 EDS customers

Sourced from one-week (Sept. 2014) sample of top search terms by market


Topical / Exploratory Search Variety

• Schools– animal cruelty– making metals harder– food in nigeria– paleontologty [sic]

• Medical– blood patch– cynara scholymus [sic]– Rheumatism– urolithiasis naturopathic perspective

• Publics– schisophrenia [sic]– myers briggs– antioxidants in tea– college success and attitude

• Academic– prison industrial complex– isostatic principle– use of pepper spray– seposki curves

Sourced from one-week (Sept. 2014) sample of random search terms by market


Observations from User ResearchObservation Implication

Exploratory queries most common query type

Discovery service must leverage subject headings and subject indexing to connect users to high quality resources relevant to search need.

Search queries usually short (1-2 words)

Discovery service needs work harder to anticipate user intent. Search features needed to help users clarity their search intent.

Search queries often broad and imprecise

Discovery service needs to help users narrow their search based on limited input. Many users looking for a topical overview on a subject.

Misspellings common Discovery service needs to work around misspellings, typographical errors.

User focus on top results Relevance ranking crucial for delivering a quality search experience. Need to optimize search to display most relevant results on first page.


EDS Relevance Ranking Explained

Relevance Ranking

The first two results provide detailed information about how relevance ranking / value ranking works in EDS…


EDS Relevance Ranking Ingredients

1. Matching word frequency

2. Metadata field weighting

3. Value ranking

4. Exact field match boost

5. Local collections weighting

No simplistic formula for relevance ranking– multiple factors blend to deliver relevant

results.


Metadata Field Weighting

Some metadata fields count more than others for scoring.

1. Subject headings

2. Title

3. Author-supplied keywords

4. Abstract

5. Author

6. Journal title

7. Full-text

More fields than these are used for field weighting.

Weighting of fields tuned on an ongoing basis.


Metadata Field Weighting

Some metadata fields count more than others for scoring.

1. Subject headings

2. Title

3. Author-supplied keywords

4. Abstract

5. Author

6. Journal title

7. Full-text

More fields than these are used for field weighting.

Weighting of fields tuned on an ongoing basis.

Keyword matches across multiple metadata fields

contribute most to relevance scoring.


Value Ranking

Specific content attributes of matching records contribute to relevance scoring.

• Publication date• Publication type• Peer reviewed or not• Document length

More attributes than these are used for value ranking. We evaluate new options on an ongoing basis.


Value Ranking



More attributes than these are used for value ranking. We evaluate new options on an ongoing basis.

Publication date:EDS will prioritize ranking of newly published content over older content.


Value Ranking



More attributes than these are used for value ranking.

New options evaluated on an ongoing basis.

Publication type:Certain publication types (journal articles) are prioritized over others (book reviews).


Delivering Relevant Results

All these factors combine to produce a composite EDS relevance score for all matching records

for the user’s search query.

No simple formula for relevance ranking, but a multitude of factors that blend to deliver the

best ordered set of results for the user query.


Relevance Ranking and the EDS API

EBSCO has a significant ongoing investment in optimizing relevance ranking.

EDS API benefits from all improvements to EDS relevance ranking.


Recent EDS Search Enhancements

Research Starters

Research Starters

Research StartersOver 62,000 topic

overviews provided by Salem Press PhDs &

Encyclopedia Britannica

Before: Results match user’s

keywords but not user expectation

Known-item Catalog Search

After: Relevance boost

applied for exact title match in catalogs

User expectation met

Known-item Catalog Search

Enhanced AutocompleteBefore: 70k terms Alpha ordered Updated quarterly

Enhanced Autocomplete

autismadolescentsanxietyadhdalcoholabortionamericaassessmentadolescenceadults

After: Millions of terms Popularity ordered Updated daily to

represent hot topics

Enhanced AutocompleteFeatures: Fuzzy matching

support to handle misspellings/typos

Multi-language support

Publication Title Placard (Beta)

Publication Title Placard (Beta)

Journal name searched, exact match found.

Publication match based on customer’s holdings

with ‘Search within’ option.


Search Enhancements Summary

• Optimize for common search use cases– Research Starters for broad topical searches– Exact title match relevance boost for catalog titles– Exact title match for publication titles

• Look beyond the user’s explicit keywords– Fuzzy matching in Autocomplete

• Leverage platform usage as a utility filter– Autocomplete queries ranked by popularity

• Deliver best results to the top of the results list– Enhanced relevance ranking and smart matching placards


Discussion / Q&A

Eds delivering-relevant-results

Marketing

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