How can I enable the system to recommend "other suggested searches" on the end-user pages?
Environment:
Customer Portal, End-user Pages
Resolution:
The EU_SUGGESTED_SEARCHES_ENABLE configuration setting enables the application to collect relevant data from end-user searches so that the system will suggest alternate search terms when subsequent users search the end-user pages.
When enabled, this feature will include suggested searches when a specific search has been performed three or more times and answers are returned with the search. That is, if a search has zero answers returned, suggested searches will not display.
Note: On Customer Portal pages, when this setting is enabled, the feature is included as part of the standard/reports/ResultInfo widget to display the relevant search terms to end-users.
To determine the words and phrases to display as suggested searches, the application compares the groups of answers that are returned for each search string. When there is a moderate degree of overlap in the answers returned, the Oracle B2C Service application will suggest the second search string when a user searches for the first string. That is, because there is enough overlap in the groups of answers returned for the two searches, the system automatically suggests the second search string.
For example: On a sample site, searching on the word "dog" returns 25 answers on the end-user page. Searching on the word "cat" returns 20 answers. When the application compares the 25 answer IDs for "dog" and 20 answer IDs for "cat", if there are enough IDs that are in both search results, then when future users search on "dog", then "cat" will be recommended as a suggested search term.
On a site where end-users do not perform many searches, or where there are not a sufficient number of answers that overlap for different searches, it may be several weeks or months, depending on the site, before sufficient data has been compiled to return Suggested Searches.
Path to setting(s): Select Configuration from the navigation area > Site Configuration > Configuration Settings > and search by Key.
For more information on accessing the Configuration Editor and editing settings, refer to Answer ID 1960: Editing Configuration Settings.Over time, the suggested searches generally appear to improve due to more data being evaluated to establish relationships between search terms and phrases and the overlapping effect of the search results. The suggested search terms are based entirely on end-user behavior and is not tied to keyword search logic. The suggested searches reflect the activity of your site visitors.
If the EU_SUGGESTED_SEARCHES_ENABLE configuration setting is set to No, this data is still gathered. However, there is a clustering algorithm that must run in order for this feature to work on your end-user pages. It is possible to leave the setting disabled for several weeks, during which time the underlying data would be gathered, then to enable the setting later. Once the clustering algorithm runs for your site, the Suggested Searches would start to be returned, assuming enough data had been gathered for that search word or phrase.
