Hardcoded Prompts on Vertical Search (June '21 Release)

Product/Library Releases & New Features Summer '21 Release
1

You can now display hardcoded prompts when a user first clicks into the empty search bar on vertical search, using the “verticalPromptsOnEmpty” config property. We always displayed these vertical prompts as autocomplete options once users started typing in the vertical search bar, but previously did not display vertical prompts before users typed. This will mirror the experience that already exists in universal search, with one exception: We do not show Mad-Lib style dynamic prompts on vertical search when a user first clicks into the search bar.

Example:

{
    "querySuggestions": {
        "popularQueriesBlacklistedTerms": [],
        "verticalPromptsOnEmpty": true, //return non-madlibs prompts on empty search for all verticals
        "universalprompts": [
            "Restaurants near me",
            "Events in the community",
            "Do you sell gift cards?",
            "Community stories"
        ],
        "verticalprompts": {
            "communityStories": [
                "Community stories",
                "Most recent community stories",
                "[[name]]",
                "Community stories published on [[date]]"
            ],
            "events": [
                "Upcoming virtual events",
                "[[name]]"
            ],
            "locations": [
                "locations near me",
                "[[name]]"
            ]
        }
    }
}

This new feature will allow administrators to guide users to suggested prompts in vertical search, without unintentionally pushing them toward any specific result.

To learn more, visit the Query Suggestions training module.