Beyond Feeling Lucky

New Yahoo! Search Gets Prospects Closer to Done

Ever heard the expression, “How do we get to yes on this?” It’s the modern version of the old used car salesman question, “What do I have to do to get you into this car?” except without the loud suit.

At Yahoo! we’re all about the “getting to yes” thing. And here at Search Marketing, we try our level best to help our advertisers get their prospects to yes every day.

But consumers see it a little differently. What consumers—your prospects—want when they search is to get it done. When users search, they usually have a task in mind that they want to get done and as quickly and painlessly possible, though sometimes they’re not sure how to get there.

Enter Search Assist. It’s a new feature on Yahoo.com that intelligently assists searchers, helping them get to “to done” in one search. When a user begins to type in a query and has difficulty, Search Assist is activated and anticipates where the user is likely trying to go, and automatically offers a selection of search term suggestions and related concepts to the query. The user can then select the search term or concept that most closely matches his or her needs, or continue to type the query.

Often, people will begin a search with only a partial idea of the language they need to use to find what it is they want. Search Assist works on the fly, inferring the user’s intent and offering search suggestions.

For example, a search for “vans” may yield “vans shoes,” “vans warped tour,” and “used vans” as suggestions —that’s three very different uses of the word “vans.” Related concepts may present “skate parks” and “apparel” as options.

So what’s in it for you, the advertiser? Well, if users get what they want faster and what they want happens to be what you’re advertising… Well, you don’t have to be the chairman of the Federal Reserve to figure it out.

—Michael Mattis