AI-Powered Search is Disrupting Keyword Search | Yext Hitchhikers Platform

What You’ll Learn

In this section, you will learn:

• How the customer journey has evolved
• How AI-powered search has evolved beyond keyword search
• The characteristics of AI-powered Search

Evolution From Keyword Search to AI-Powered Search

For many years search was very simple. Search Engines would take a query and try to match it to any document that contain those keywords. Keyword search had been around for decades with little innovation.

But then things started to change.

Consumer Search engines started to develop algorithms that were not based on keywords but based on natural language understanding and AI. This led to the rise of AI-powered search. A user can now ask a question and get a direct answer.

For some reason, none of that innovation made its way to the enterprise search platforms. They are still delivering the same old keyword search while the consumer web has continued to evolve.

That’s why site search and enterprise search are still so bad at every company.

Key Characteristics of an AI-Powered Search Engine

AI-powered search has some key characteristics:

AI-powered search can handle natural language questions. We have seen an explosion of NL experiences from desktop and mobile search to voice search to chatbots. The ability to interact digitally via natural language is the next big shift in user experience.

AI-powered search leverages multiple algorithms. Different types of data are best searched leveraging different algorithms. So if you are searching images, help articles, FAQs or anything AI-powered search leverages the best algorithm for that type of data to delivery the best answer.

Finally, AI-powered search leverages a knowledge graph in order to deliver a direct answer to your question. A knowledge graph is a semantic data structure, built on real-world entities and relationships. Now when someone asks “What is the phone number for CGH Medical Center?” you get a direct answer instead of a list of documents.

The Value of AI-Powered Search

When companies adopt AI-powered search technology they are seeing incredible value.

• Marketing teams are seeing a 1.4x increase in onsite conversions with AI-powered search
• Support teams are seeing happier customers with higher CSAT scores and reduced Time to Resolution
• Developers are able to leverage the latest and greatest in AI-powered Natural Language advancements
• Ecommerce teams are seeing a 50% increase in average order value by leveraging machine learning
• Workplace teams are driving better productivity as employees are finding content faster and working more productively with AI-powered search.