Searching a Web site:

The state of the traditional keyword site search experience on the Web was summarized by Forrester Research in 2000, "Search stinks", and again in 2002, "Search still stinks". There are many reasons why the current standard site search experience is unsatisfactory to both web user and enterprise:

1. A web user doesn't search unless he/she has to
   Users come to sites with specific objectives and choose to search when it is not obvious how to find the content they seek by navigation. Customer experience studies by UIE, a leading research-driven company specializing in web-site and product usability, demonstrate that web users are in general not predisposed to initially choose search or browse for navigation.  See report here: http://www.uie.com/articles/search_stinks/
    
2. Search usually fails
   Users who try to search for content usually fail. UIE customer experience studies have found that a traditional keyword search engine provides only a 30-35% chance of finding content that is on a site. This compares with a 50-55% chance if users stick with browsing. Reasons for customer experience failure include inaccuracies in the search technology and web users not recognizing the desired result
    
3. A web user is impatient
   In UIE customer experience studies 47% of users give up after the first failed search attempt, and 77% after the second failed attempt and that the chances of users finding the content decreases with each subsequent search attempt.
    
4. Succinct data is not available
   The specific information that users seek is often not on the site, because site managers and others responsible for managing the customer experience don't know that users want it. The analytic benefits of natural language search do not accrue from overly general keyword queries and fail to clearly identify the information that users seek.

5. Persistence doesn't pay off
   Persistent users that explore content linked by multiple search results, generally fail. UIE customer experience studies have demonstrated that the more times the web user goes back to the results page to the less likely they are to reach a satisfactory conclusion. 
    
6. Search has tunnel vision
   When successful at finding content with search, users fail to discover additional relevant content. Searchers find only what they are looking for, while browsers discover additional content. UIE customer experience studies have found that: on eCommerce sites browsers have a larger average shopping basket than searchers, and only 20% of searchers continue to look at other content after finding their result, while 62% of browsers explore additional content.
    
7. A web user over-generalizes
   A web user will enter short keyword queries that overly generalize the information objective. This makes it impossible to reliably provide information at the top of the results list. Numerous customer experience studies show that users will enter a 2 word query on average. The chances of returning the desired content at or near the top of the results list are minimal from such a search experience.