Best Bets for Enterprise Search

Normally, the search engine ranks results based on the quality and number of matches between the words a query and the words in each document. Using titles, descriptions, and meta-tag keywords you can influence the rank for a document with particular queries. Also, using explicit page weights you can push a document up or down for all queries. (For details, see the library paper on Page Ordering.) However, without using the Best Bets feature, you cannot guarantee that a page will be listed first. With Best Bets you can specify explicitly what pages should be listed at the top of the search results for particular queries. Each Best Bet is described by a set of word patterns, a URL, and a page description. If all of the patterns match a query, then the URL and description are output at the top of the search results. For more details, see the Search Guide section on Best Bets.

Explicit setting of document dates

The Blossom engine allows results to be sorted by relevance or by date. Usually the date for a document is taken from the file system, but sometimes that date is not accurate, such as when the document is generated dynamically or when the files have been copied. For HTML files, the document date can be set using the HTTP-EQUIV meta tag (see the Search Guide for details.) Recently we have added the same capability to PDF files--the technique is described in the Search Guide section mentioned above.

Dollar and time entities now recognized

The search engine has been upgraded to recognize two more entities, dollar amounts and times of day. Previously the engine recognized postal addresses, email addresses, zip codes, and phone numbers.

An entity stands for a class of items. When an entity is recognized, the search engine can match a query to any member of the class instead of just a keyword. For example, the query "license cost" matches documents that have the word "license" near a dollar amount (in addition to documents containing the word "license" near the word "cost". Similarly, a query "when does the store open" will match documents containing the words "store" and "open" near a time of day.

Interview with Blossom Founder

One of Blossom's founders, Alan Feuer, was interviewed recently by Steve Arnold, a well-respected technology analyst who specializes in search. The interview gives some insight into the philosophy underlying Blossom search. You can read the interview at ArnoldIT. Steve also authors a blog where he writes cogently about search technology and companies.

Search engine enhancements

In the latest enhancement of the search engine, a few changes were made in the appearance of the output:

• An ordering option has been added allowing a searcher to sort by relevance or date.
• Pagination has been turned on by default, so the "more" option is no longer needed.
• The heading that tells which documents are being shown has been simplified for long result lists.

In addition, the entity extraction feature has been extended to include postal addresses in addition to phone numbers and email addresses.

Entity Search

We have begun adding an exciting new feature to the search engine called entity search. An entity is something like a phone number or an email address that can be recognized by its format and context. During indexing, the search engine now recognizes a variety of entities.

At query time the search engine looks for certain keywords in the query. If they are present it performs an entity search in addition to a regular keyword search. For example, in a search for "main office phone number", in addition to looking for pages that contain all of the query words, it will also look for pages that contain "main office" near a phone-number entity. As a result, it will find pages where there is a phone number, but not necessarily the phrase "phone number".

Over the next few months we will be adding support for new entities such as dates, times, and zip codes. We welcome your suggestions for other entities to add.

New pricing, Lower cost

We are happy to report that 2007 was a banner year for Blossom. With increased revenue and lower server costs, we are able to increase page limits to lower your costs.

Pricing for Site Search has been simplified and lowered: $10 for the first $1000 pages plus $5 for each additional 750 pages.

Page limits for Affinity Search and Enterprise Search have been raised. Affinity Search now costs $100 for the first 20,000 pages plus $5 for each additional 3,000 pages. Enterprise Search costs $200 for the first 80,000 pages plus $5 for each additional 5,000 pages. Both Affinity and Enterprise Search come with a free monthly link audit.

These new rates will be effective on your next invoice.