Don't Put Search on your Site if it Sucks

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Don't Put Search on your Site if it Sucks

I just spent 15 minutes wrestling with the internal search tool on AdWeek trying to track down an article. I had the title, what the article was about and the month it ran and still I was unable to track it down. I was getting hundreds of results, supposedly ranked by relevance, and I was unable to filter it down. Then, I searched on Google, with just the name of the article and of the publication and bang, got it in 0.03 seconds. I don't know how much AdWeek spent for their enterprise search tool but it was too much.

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Print | posted @ Thursday, July 26, 2007 3:18 PM

Comments on this entry:

# re: Don't Put Search on your Site if it Sucks

by Manoj at 7/26/2007 10:01 PM

Google site search is a simple and effective option. It might be a nice test for them, they could consider things like: time spent on site and abandonment rates.

# re: Don't Put Search on your Site if it Sucks

by Dave at 7/27/2007 9:54 AM

I hear you Gord! Thanks for all the emails eh? It's good to see a search guru in Canada like yourself.

re: Don't Put Search on your Site if it Sucks

by Nick Fiekowsky at 7/31/2007 7:19 AM

... and that's why Google's Custom Search Business Edition (CSBE) is likely to be a huge hit for public websites while cramping cash flow for enterprise search vendors. For about $100 / year you can make google.com your site's search engine - without adwords or sponsored links. No servers. No backup problems. All the benefits of their user interface and page ranking mojo. As a former colleague put it, "You can spend more, but you'll get less."