Search and sensibility: Four tales of search. Presented at OZ-IA Conference, Sydney Sept. 20th 2008 Advanced Session, presented by Louisa Cameron, Angus Fraser, Scott Bryant, Chris Khalil (News Digital Media). With the improved quality and growing user familiarity with search engines, site search is now an integral aspect of the IA for any information-rich website, yet there is more than one kind of site search. Different types of search can evolve to meet the needs of different users in different contexts. The audience will hear about four different search contexts and will be shown how some tailored search mechanisms have been deployed on large commercial websites: Careerone.com.au have conducted research and usability studies to learn about our job seekers and to find out about the unique context of job hunting. TrueLocal.com.au is a local business directory where information is mapped to physical locations. What are the conventions & challenges of “local search”? What do users mean by “here”? What are the differences between web and mobile implementations? Carsguide.com.au realises that searching for cars isn't easy, particularly if you don't know anything about cars. Guided search offers a way to assist users to move through the car buying process. We'll share some insights gained from designing guided search and share the challenges of positioning search and browse. Increasingly search is driving traffic not just to your homepage but also to pages on lower levels of your site. To really harness this traffic it's important to start treating these lower level pages as mini homepages. News.com.au are doing this by using search to generate contextually relevant links and hence harvest long tail traffic. We will compare and contrast the search experiences offered by these different services and in discussing the issues and considerations behind them reveal some of the lessons learned and offer pointers for improving your own work in search. This will be a group presentation, delivered by four members of the News Digital Media experience architecture team. Each presenter will give a brief outline of the project they worked on, including the lessons learned from an IA practitioner's perspective.

1. Search & Sensibility
Four tales of search
Sept 2008
Louisa Cameron
Senior Experience Architect, USiT
News Digital Media

2. Search is unique, depending on
the context
“… a widespread and mistaken perception that
search is little more than a white search box
adorned with the occasional appealing graphics”
Marc Quantrill
Source: MAD Technology Weekly UK, Aug 2008

3. Searchers have different needs
“When I find an article I like,
I find myself clicking through
all the related stuff”
“It’s not like I’m looking for a job,
but if something better comes along…”

4. It is important to understand
behaviour patterns
“After asking thousands of people to think
about how they search, only one thing has
been consistent in our findings. People
don’t really know.”
Source: Google Eye Tracking report, Enquiro, Eyetools and Did-It, July 2005

5. Job seeker personas
1. Career based
Looking for dream job.
2. Change based
Seeking work-life balance.
3. Needs based
Return to work mother looking for local job.

6. Behaviour patterns of job seekers
1. Not brand loyal
2. Search using set criteria
3. Search every 3 days when active
4. Need to refine within results
5. Look at 5 or 6 pages of results

7. 1. Job seekers are not brand loyal
• For general search, people probably use same
search engine every time they search
• There is an argument for designing similar to
competitors to create a consistent experience

8. 2. Job seekers search using a set of
criteria

9. Is advanced search necessary?
quot;Advanced search is the ugly child of
interface design - always included, but
never loved.quot;
Stephen Turbek
Source: Boxes and Arrows, Jan 2008

10. Is advanced search necessary?

11. 3. Job seekers refine within results

12. 3. Job seekers refine within results

13. 4. Active job seekers visit every 3 days
• Search on last 3 days
• Save search
• Show new listings

15. 5. Job seekers look at 5 or 6
pages of results

16. In summary …
“Designers can better cater to what appears to be
chaos: make available those capabilities that
best support the range of known behavior
patterns for your target personas”
John Ferrara
Source: Boxes and Arrows, Jan 2008

17. Local Search
Tale 2/4
Angus Fraser
Senior Experience Architect, USiT
News Digital Media 1

18. Home page Results page

19. Interesting details
! Arrangement of fields & buttons
! Helping user’s construct better queries
! Encouraging Discovery

21. Placement of search fields
-“What can I do here?
I’m not sure what kind
of site this is”

22. Strong domain conventions

23. Conflicting convention
-“… the login fields
here are a waste of
space”

24. The “Search” button
“Don't use a 'Search' button for parametric search”
Jakob Nielsen (http://www.useit.com/alertbox/20050509.html)

25. Search

26. Improving queries: Auto-suggest

27. Improving Queries: Auto-history

29. Encouraging discovery

30. Going with the flow

31. “Short head” with multiple faces

32. Guided Search
Tale 3/4
Scott Bryant
Senior Experience Architect, USiT
News Digital Media

33. 4 key things
1. What do we mean by guided search?
2. The car buying process & search
3. Features of guided search
4. Multi-selection search scenario

34. What do we mean by guided search?
• A “Funnelquot;
• More than just facets
• Exploratory search
• Provides “information
scent”
• Predictive of users
previous and next
steps
• Navigation paths built
on structured data

35. 98,106 cars online
(Business goal #1)
“right car for you”

36. No zero results
(Business goal #2)

37. What we know about our users
• They don’t know what type of car they want or what their
money can buy
• The majority search for used cars, but are after recent
models
• Are seeking specific advice

38. 1.Cars for sale

39. 2.Car
Specifications

40. 3.Car Values

41. 4.Dealer
Search

42. 5.Cars for sale –
Guided search
on mobile

43. Features of Guided Search Interface
Guided Search: Browse:
• Great for people who have an idea what they • Great for people who are unsure of what they are
want looking for
• Option to do a new and used combined search • The default will include new and used cars
• Advanced options available, i.e. number of seats, • Additional options available, i.e. transmission
power..

44. Results
Features
Indication of Research and
what has been reviews relevant
searched. to your search
Remove to
expand
Sets of
standard Information rich
expanded summary of
refinement results
dimensions
Secondary set
of further
refinement
dimensions

46. Comparing cars & multi-select

47. Final thoughts
The challenge for designing for guided
search comes down to balancing:
• Users information needs
• Constraints/Flexibility of structured data
• Context for use (search scenarios)
And keeping a complex system simple

48. Media Search
Tale 4/4
Chris Khalil
Senior Experience Architect, USiT
News Digital Media

49. What’s it all about?
1. Homepage is most important page?
2. Content Page
3. Using search to feed search
4. Anatomy of a Content Page
5. Finish

50. Traffic – Last Month
Page Impressions:
94,913,965
that’s a lot of traffic
The home page accounts for
less than half of that

51. From where
Email
Search engines
Blogs
Your Site Instant Message
Other Sites
Social Network Sites
Aggregators

52. Ecology
Pages don’t exist solely in the context of your IA
Search is really good nowadays

53. Content Page is the new
Homepage
How to drive traffic from search
Using search

54. news.com.au Storypage
A cul-de-sac
Not very
contextual
Interesting content
Limited exit points

55. New news.com.au Storypage
There’s loads
here

56. Most Related Links
I’ve read enough,
offer me
somewhere else
-News grazer

57. What now?
Reward me for
getting this far
- News hunter

58. Contextual Linking
If you liked that,
then you might like
this
Other topics

59. Body Topic Links
More Topics
Click here

60. Tell me more…
What’s been going
on with Qantas?

61. What search thinks of Qantas
Is this most
relevant or
most
articles?

62. So, is it working?
Early signs are positive
Significant uplift in PI’s

63. The real value of search

64. Questions or Suggestions?
• Louisa Cameron – Senior Experience
Architect, CareerOne.com.au
• Angus Fraser – Senior Experience Architect,
TrueLocal.com.au
• Scott Bryant - Senior Experience Architect,
CarsGuide.com.au
• Chris Khalil – Senior Experience Architect,
news.com.au