Internal search

As part of our work to move from Episerver to Contentful, we’re using a new search platform to manage internal search results. Our new search platform is called Swiftype. Features include:

• engines

• metrics

• result rankings

• weights

• synonyms

• preview

Engines

Engines control how search works for different parts of our site - for example, public site or AdviserNet. This means we can have different settings for each engine, like a different set of synonyms or pinned results.

We have the following engines set up in Swiftype:

1. Public site - logged in and logged out

2. AdviserNet

3. Intranet

4. Production vs development - used for testing search before going live

Metrics

Metrics are broken down into 2 sections - analytics and insights.

Analytics

Analytics shows the engine’s traffic and performance. You can see: 

• how many searches have been made for a specific time period

• popular searches

These can all be exported in a CSV file for use in Google Sheets or Excel.

Insights

Insights give tips for how to improve the search experience. It uses the data provided in analytics.

You can see:

• searches with no results

• searches that appeared but the results weren’t clicked on

These can all be exported in a CSV file for use in Google Sheets or Excel.

Result rankings

Result rankings give you control over what appears in search results and in what order.

There are 2 parts to result rankings:

1. Pinning - the custom placement of a result in search results

2. Deleting - the removal of a result from a result set

Pinning results is quite a drastic measure, we should only pin a result when we’re confident there’s nothing else we can do to change the search results - for example, editing the meta description or redesigning the page.

If you pin a result, set a reminder to review it if you still need the pinned result. You can check if it’s still needed by testing the search with the preview function after unpinning the result.

Weights

You can fine-tune how the search performs with ‘weights’. Weights use fields that can be found in Contentful, like:

• body

• title

• meta description

This means we can control how important each field is for determining what appears in a search.

Synonyms

You can relate 2 or more words together to form a ‘synonym set’. Synonym sets can be used to capture the different words people use when searching for content.

For now, we've made synonym sets for initialisms and acronyms like:

• pip = personal independence payment

• jsa = job seeker’s allowance

• cab, citizens advice bureau and citizens advice bureaux = citizens advice

You don’t need to create synonyms for things like:

• pluralisations - for example, bike and bikes, fox and foxes

• tenses - for example, jump, jumped and jumping

• common terms like a, as, the - for example, the elephant and an elephant

Preview

You can test what will come up in an internal search with the preview function. Based on what comes up, you can make further tweaks to result rankings or synonym sets. 

Documentation

Swiftype provides documentation on the different parts of the system. You can read more about Swiftype on their website.

Getting access to Swiftype

Message Adam Smith on Slack to request a Swiftype account.