The New Search Experience

Over the years, the way users have searched for answers has certainly evolved.  In the past, an individual may have conducted a simple Google search that included a few words/phrases to find an answer to a particular question.  For businesses, perhaps a knowledge base was utilized to find answers to frequently asked questions (FAQs).  But now, the consumer search experience is changing the way the enterprise search is being looked at.

The consumer experience is no longer just about entering a lengthy string of words into a search field, or visiting a dedicated page for FAQs.  It is more about drilling down the search term(s) and filtering the information to find the exact answer that you need.  Similar to the idea of “semantic web,” enterprises should start thinking this way for internal support answers.

In the past at RightAnswers, we focused much of our efforts on internal (employee) support.  But now as we expand our focus to external (customer) support, we see how these two worlds collide.  Regardless of whether you are dealing with internal or external support, the basis of providing good service is having easy access to information needed to quickly (and accurately) provide customers answers to their questions.

With a number of access points – Web search engines, self-service portals, virtual agents, etc. – available to end-users, the bottom line still remains that individuals want to quickly find the solutions to their problems.  While some search practices may be new, they should all have the same end-result: improving the customer experience.

All Roads Don’t Lead Home

Nothing is more annoying than going to a website only to be confronted with multiple search dialogues that all search different repository.  I was recently on a PC manufacturer site and wasted half an hour searching their product support page for an issue I was having with a driver only to realize the driver-specific support page had its own search.  Not to mention looming in the top right corner there was yet another search box that one could use at any time to search for information about the company itself. 

Coming from a technology and development background and working at a company the makes search effectiveness its number priority, it’s scary to think it took me a while to figure out this company’s support search strategy.  I can only imagine what level of success my father would have finding issues for his own PC issues when I’m unavailable to play the role of family support desk. 

That said, we’re all really excited about some of the new approaches we’re taking to search that help customers develop an Enterprise Knowledge Foundation, and get rid of all of those confusing search boxes.  Tools like RightAnswers Enterprise Gateway enable customers with broader search initiatives leveraging Google Appliances, custom search tools, Autonomy, FAST, or a developed SharePoint portal to make our knowledge a part of their Enterprise search results eliminating the need to create a another search.  Likewise customers using other search tools can easily leverage RightAnswers as their Enterprise search portal; leveraging our knowledgebase technology to hold IT and non-IT knowledge and crawl other data sources in their organization where knowledge resides in various unstructured formats.

Next time you’re on your own corporate site or a consumer site and cannot figure out which road leads to the right answer remember RightAnswers can help you and your customers whoever they may be.