Site Search Best Practices: Methods For Creating A Positive Search Experience

Site search is a critical but unfulfilling part of Web site user experiences. As complex as search may seem, users only need two things for a positive site search experience: relevant results and a useful interface. Today's leading sites use a number of best practices to help users get what they need, such as using autosuggest to help users select the right search terms, recognizing and helping users recover from misspellings, allowing users to filter results by meaningful criteria, and providing alternative search options where appropriate. To get started, customer experience professionals should design search to work with user-centered language, compensate for unintended errors, and blend the search and browse experience.