Site Search > Configurations > Basic Configurations

The SearchStax Site Search solution has an easy-to-use interface for updating, enhancing, and managing the search experience for your website.

The “Basic Configurations” are the easy adjustments that business users can make in the search experience.

• Search Fields: Match user queries against a list of Search Fields.
• Results Fields: Choose which fields to return in the search results.
• Faceting: Choose which fields to use for facet generation.
• Ranking: Apply “boost” multipliers to results that meet special criteria.
• Spell Check: When a query returns no results, it automatically runs a new query using a similar word from the index.
• Stopwords: Common words to remove from queries to obtain sharper focus.

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Introduction

The SearchStax Site Search solution’s Hosted Search Experience provides a Vue.js Based Search Interface for your Site Search App. It serves PCs, tablets, and mobile platforms with equal facility.

The Hosted Search Experience allows users to:

• Search using keywords
• View a “Smart Answers” AI-based response when the query takes the form of a question.
• Show search results in grid or list format
• Track searches and clicks for analysis
• Search with auto-suggest/ auto-complete feature
• Show facets (refinements) as configured in the Studio
• Pagination of search results
• Result sorting by customizable options.
• Show did-you-mean suggestions for misspellings
• Show related searches
• Show external promotions
• Ability to apply transformation functions to show fields
• Ability to submit feedback for tracking and analysis

Implementation

Each Site Search App has its own Hosted Search app out of the box. To access it, navigate to Site Search > Configurations > Search UI > Hosted Search App.

The Hosted Search App is preconfigured to provide an appropriate search experience to the Search App’s index and settings. Click the View button to open the Hosted Search App in a browser window. You can copy the URL to share with stakeholders and coworkers.

Each time you update the Search Experience in any way, click the Regenerate button before using the Hosted Search App.

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The SearchStax Site Search solution provides resources to implement search in the front-end of your headless web application. These resources are meant to accelerate the development of the search page regardless of your environment.

• JavaScript or JS Frameworks
• Search UI Rest APIs

Here is a brief overview of each of these resources.

JavaScript or JS Frameworks

There is a strong push toward headless CMS systems to manage, deliver and render content for users. For more background on headless content management systems, see What are Headless Content Management Systems?

SearchStax Site Search lets you build your search page using pre-built UI components in various JavaScript frameworks in headless environments. You can find the JS Frameworks by navigating to Site Search > Configurations > Search UI > UI Kits.

Click the icon of the framework you prefer. The blue button at the bottom of the screen will take you to its documentation.

There are four JS Framework options:

• JavaScript is a programming language for creating interactive web pages. It can be used for both front-end and back-end development.
• Vue is a JavaScript-based framework that creates web applications using a data object and HTML templates. It is known to be smaller, faster, and easier to use than other frameworks.
• React is a JavaScript library that creates web applications using a state object and JSX. It is ideal for larger and more complex applications. Our React widgets also work with Next.js.
• Angular JS is a JavaScript-based web application framework based on the concept of components. It supports full-stack development for building all types of web applications, especially single-page applications (SPAs).

SearchStudio UX Packages

For each of the UX Packages, you can find the Framework description, the Getting Started page, and NPM Package Libraries to build search pages:

Widgets Directory

Here are the Widgets for each framework that can be used to create search experiences. The links go the NPMJS packages for each framework – JavaScript, Vue, React and Angular.

Pages Directory

The Pages directory contains example applications that demonstrate how to use the various widgets together to build real apps. Follow the links to GitHub below to see the application that implements one or more of the available Framework-related widgets:

Search UI Rest APIs

SearchStax Site Search includes several APIs to streamline and accelerate the implementation process.

See the Site Search API Overview for more information on the Search, Analytics, Discovery, and Ingest APIs.

Questions?

Do not hesitate to contact the SearchStax Support Desk.

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Site Search > Analytics > Overview

One of the key benefits of the SearchStax Site Search solution is the robust site search analytics provided by the application.

Explore the detailed pages below to learn more about analytics in Site Search:

• Dashboard – the Site Search Analytics Dashboard is the starting point for understanding what is going on with search for your website
• Searches – the Searches page provides high level analytics for searches on your website and then lets you dive into the top searches, no result searches and searches with no clicks
• Content Items – the Items page delivers insights around the content that was searched on your website including top level statistics for Total Impressions, Clicks and Click-Through Rate and then a listing of the Most Clicked and Least Clicked Content
• Custom Reports – Create your own custom reports around Searches or Content Items, and then export them as a .CSV file
• Search Feedback – Summarize the user feedback ratings and comments from the Feedback Widget on your search page
• Analytics Glossary – A listing of the terms and definitions used by SearchStax Site Search

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Site Search > Analytics > Dashboard

Analytics – Dashboard is the landing page for entering the SearchStax Site Search solution. It displays summary statistics for the selected Search App.

Contents:

• Selecting the Search App
• Selecting the Date Range
• Summary Statistics
• Search Success Metrics
• Related Searches

Selecting the Search App

To select an App, pull down the Viewing menu in the Profile Selector at the top of the screen.

Selecting the Date Range

The summary statistics are relative to the date range. Several predefined ranges are available, plus a custom Date Range option.

The Date Range presents a calendar display where you can select a starting date, navigate to another month if necessary, and select an ending date. Click Apply to refresh the Dashboard.

Note that the Search App retains user data for a limited time, depending on your product plan. In a live system, new analytics data is recorded in a constant stream. The new events usually appear on the Dashboard within an hour of posting, but there are situations where a 24-hour delay can occur.

Summary Statistics

During the last month, this selected App recorded over 1.9k searches, and 539 searches with click-through events. Roughly 43% of the searches ended with a clicked item.

Average search latency (time between request and response) was 135.7 ms, which was a 43% decrease from the previous month. Decreased latency is a good sign, so the percent figure is highlighted in green. (Bad news is red.)

Search Success Metrics

Further down on the same screen are graphs depicting various measures of search success.

• Average Click Position: The mean position of clicked items in the search results over a specific time interval (one month in the illustration). We would like to see this trend go downward, meaning that the desired result is getting closer to the top of the list.
• Click-Through Rate: Click-through events divided by the number of searches in a specific time interval, expressed as a percentage. We would like to see this trend upward, meaning that users are finding more items of interest.
• No Results Searches: Percent of total searches that produced zero results over a specific time period. We would like to see this trend continue downward. Adjust suggestions, improve spelling correction, add synonyms, or create new content to improve.

The graph labeled Top 10% of Searches displays the above metrics for the most frequent search keywords recorded by the system. This sample represents the bulk of the actual user search events. (The least-frequent searches are usually random words that defocus the trends we are following.)

Related Searches

At the bottom of the page is a graph depicting the activity around Related Searches.

• Total Searches: All searches logged during the selected time interval.
• Searches with Related Searches: Number of total searches that offered at least one Related Search.
• Related Searches with Clicks: Number of Related Searches that were launched by the search user.
• Related Searches Click-Through Rate: “Related Searches with Clicks” divided by “Searches with Related Searches” x 100.

See our Analytics Glossary for a list of all SearchStax Site Search metrics.

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Site Search > Analytics > Searches

The SearchStax Site Search solution’s Analytics Searches screen summarizes the user actions that the Search App has accumulated over the selected time period. 

Interpreting Analytics

Interpreting user behavior through analytics history is an art. See these SearchStax blog posts for insight into your website users’ behavior:

• Content Gap Analysis: How to Avoid Gaps in Your Content Strategy
• Introducing Smart Match Assist: AI-Powered Query Optimization for SearchStax Site Search
• Site Search Data Unveiled: 7 Key Insights into Your Website Visitors’ Behavior
• Website User Experience – Data and Trends

Summary Statistics

The summary table at the top of the page presents a high-level look at search success during a configurable time period.

• Total Sessions: Total search sessions during the selected time period.
• Total Searches: There can be multiple searches per session.
• Searches per Session: Total Searches divided by Total Sessions.
• % Search Exits: Percent of sessions that ended from the search page.
• Searches with Clicks: Number of searches that ended with a click-through event.
• Click-Through Rate: Percent of Total Searches that ended in a click-through event.
• Average Click Position: Average of the positions of the items that were clicked in the list of results.
• % No Results: Percent of Total Searches that produced zero results.
• MRR: Mean Reciprocal Rank. The average of 1/Click Position for all click-through events. It normalizes the score to the range 0 to 1, with 1 being best.

Most Popular Searches

The Most Popular Searches list presents the queries users submitted most frequently during the time interval. 

• Searches: Queries typed into the search field.
• Search Count: Number of times this term was submitted in the designated time interval.
• Of Total: Percent of all searches in the time interval.

Search Details

Click on an item to expand it and view the results that users eventually selected. 

The summary statistics across the top of the page are:

• Total Searches: Total Number of Search Requests in the selected time interval. These include searches with results and searches with no results
• Total Searches with Clicks: Total Number of Searches with at least one click on a result item.
• Total Clicks: Total Number of clicks on the Search Results that were shown to the user
• Click-through Rate: The percentage of tracked searches that generated at least one click on a result. Mathematically, it is (Number of searches with at least 1 click / Total Searches) * 100
• Average Click Position: Average of the positions of the impressions that were clicked in the list of results

The Search Details display shows that twelve users typed in “Search UI App.” Five of those users clicked on one of the results. 

• Item Title: The title of a document users clicked after searching for the keyword.
• Impression Count: The number of times this item was presented to users in search results.
• Average Click Position: Average position of this item when users selected it.
• Click Count: Number of times users clicked this item.
• Click Through Rate: Percent of clicks divided by Impression Count.

Use the browser’s “back” button to return to the Analytics – Search page.

No Results Searches

The Analytics > Searches screen also lists No Result Searches. (Users looked for something that wasn’t in your index.)

The View Recommendations button displays the output of the Smart Match Assist feature, which uses AI to generate queries that are similar to the ones in the table but would have produced results.

Searches with No Click

Scroll down one more screen to view the list of searches that produced results, but the user didn’t click on anything. 

See our Analytics Glossary for a list of all SearchStax Site Search metrics.

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Site Search > Analytics > Content Items

The SearchStax Site Search solution’s Content Items screen presents insights on the content that mattered most, least, and that did not interest the viewer. It shows lists of ranked result-items, and lets you click through to see the searches that led to each item. 

• Total Impressions: Number of result items displayed during the selected time interval.
• Total Clicks: Number of click-through events in the selected time interval.
• Items Click-Through Rate: Percentage of Total Impressions that received a click-through event.

The Most Clicked table shows the result items that were clicked the most. 

• Item Title: The title of a document that users clicked on during the selected time interval.
• Impression Count: The number of times that this item was presented to users in search results during the selected time interval.
• Click Count: Number of click-through events for this item in the selected time interval.
• Item Click-Through Rate: Percent of Impressions that were clicked on.

You can click on any item to see the Item Details view. 

• Total Searches: Number of searches in this time period that matched this item.
• Total Impressions: Number of times the item was presented to users in the results list.
• Total Clicks: Number of click-through events on this item.
• Item Click-Through Rate: Percent of Impressions that received a click-through event.

Use the “back” button to return to the Content Items screen. Scroll down to view the list of “Least Clicked,” meaning content items that had little or no engagement. 

See our Analytics Glossary for a list of all SearchStax Site Search metrics.

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Site Search > Analytics > Custom Reports

A SearchStax Site Search solution’s Search App is a database that collects user search events from your search page. The Custom Reports (formerly “Power Search”) screen lets you filter this collection of keywords and content items. You can set up filters using the drop-down fields at the top of the screen. After selecting a time period, you can search for either Searches (keywords) or Items.

For Searches, we can filter for six search-related metrics. The form offers six inequality tests and a number input field.

• Search Count: Number of searches in the selected time period that used this keyword.
• Hits: Number of items that match this search.
• Click Count: Number of click-through events resulting from these searches.
• Average Click Position: Average position of the result item that received a click-through event.
• Click-Through Rate: Percent of searches that received a click-through event.
• Latency: Average time to process a search.

For Items, we can filter for three metrics:

• Impression Count: Number of times this item was presented to users as a search result.
• Click Count: Number of times a user clicked on this item.
• Item Click-Through Rate: Percent of Impressions that received a click-through event.

At the far right of the line are two buttons:    The (+) button lets us apply multiple filters simultaneously. The search button (magnifying glass) executes the current search. 

A successful search produces a table of keywords or items. Note that you can sort the table by column, which opens up some powerful insights into the data. You can also Export the table as a .CSV file.

You can click through to a Search Details or Item Details screen as needed. 

See our Analytics Glossary for a list of all SearchStax Site Search metrics.

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Site Search > Analytics > Search Feedback

Asking users directly about their search experience can provide actionable insights. Questions such as “How satisfied are you with the search results?” help gauge the overall success of the search experience. For instance, the Search UI Kit supports a Feedback Widget for collecting this input.

The SearchStax Site Search solution’s Search Feedback page summarizes and tabulates the user feedback messages from your company’s Search Page, as collected by the Feedback Widget. 

The graph on the left is the Net Promoter Score, which is a metric that summarizes the overall positive/negative feedback on a scale from -100 to 100. Positive numbers are good.

The center display shows detractors (feedback 0 to 6), Neutrals (7-8), and Promoters (9 and 10). Of course you can slice the feedback by weekly, monthly, and annual time intervals. 

A little farther down the screen is a table of feedback ratings and messages, along with the email of the feedback source (blurred here for privacy). Note that you can sort the columns for more insight. 

See our Analytics Glossary for a list of all SearchStax Site Search metrics.

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This is a glossary of analytics metrics reported by the SearchStax Site Search solution. For an in-depth discussion of metrics and best practices, see our blog on UX Best Practices for Site Search.

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