How to make searchersbetter searchers

Vivian Lin Dufour21 Oct 2010

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Not all searchers are IR experts, and even if they were…

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Choosing the right search path is like…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/24638512@N07/3464444903/

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Choosing the right search path is like…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/minebilder/197328450

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3 innovations will address

• How do we help users survey several aspects of their topic?

• How do we help users discover queries that will retrieve trending topics?

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#1 Query Session Suggestions

http://www.flickr.com/photos/moning/87839211/

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Related Searches

• choice, breadth and depth

• Survey the most topics and sites about my query in a short amount of time

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Information Scent

• Assist users in formulating tail queries that return more specialized results

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Information Scent

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#2 Inter-Session Suggestions

http://www.flickr.com/photos/moning/87839211/

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Informative even before user submits search…

• Suggest document titles as information scent

• Cohort suggestions to direct users towards more specialized or related searches

Thu Oct 14

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Inter-session example: chile miners (1)

• Increase coverage of latest news

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Inter-session example: chile miners (2)

• Also easier to find relevant and recent articles for more context

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• Use document titles to direct users towards better searches

• Use cohort suggestions to direct users towards more specialized or related searches

Inter-session example: london (Oct 1)

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Recent top result clicked from ‘london underground’ leads to…

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Latest news results for london underground

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#3 Inter-Session Trending Suggestions

http://www.flickr.com/photos/moning/87839211/

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Informative, Fresh results as you type

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Surface latest hot topic for query prefix

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Federated rich content as you type!

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Crowd sourcing: what’s trending?

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Crowd sourcing and My Search

My Search

Everyone’sSearches

My Search

Everyone’sSearches

Trending

Trending Topic is a function of:

• Consumers, Publishers, Common Experience

• Consumers = My Interests + Twitter + Search logs

• Publishers = Y! Front Page, News sources

• Common Experience = holidays, events

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What’s popular now in the world?

• Discover 12-24 hours before major news sources

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Yahoo! a directive search engine

paving the path for users…

http://www.flickr.com/photos/stormdog42/4328270524/sizes/o/

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…to make them better searchers

• Matching content previews help disambiguation and query refinement

• Empower users with deeper levels of assistance and discover new leads

• Near-real time federation as you type

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Thank you!Vivian Lin Dufour

Product Manager, Search

• And still create a relevant experience that is serendipitous!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/adrian_valentin_murphy/354252383/