Enterprise Search Summit is an annual event held in New York City, now in its
8th year. The focus of the conference is on real world experiences. It is a
forum where business owners of enterprise search technology can share
experiences, and develop insight on the future of search technology.
I had
the privilege of attending, and presenting, this year. I saw three
main themes from the presentations I attended.
- We are not alone.
- Semantic web technology is moving away from cutting edge and towards
mainstream.
- Mobile search is key for intranets to deliver
value.
On
the theme of "we are not alone", Kristian Norling of Findwise
presented some initial results from a survey he conducted with Enterprise Search
product managers. In the survey, the majority reported poor user experience with
search, significant need for information retrieval, and minimal staffing. He
was kind enough to post his slides on Slideshare.
On
the theme of Semantic Web concepts becoming mainstream, Tom Reamy presented on
applying semantics to search text analytics - showing how to leverage semantic
relationships with your search engine to provide better results. This is a
mechanism to leverage the existing taxonomy and metadata within the content to
provide business value and improve findability. These concepts are core to a Knowledge environment.
With
mobile search, there were two great presentations. The first was by Colin
Jeavons focused on the need for mobile search. By 2015 there will be 2 billion
mobile devices across the globe.
Should we deny our users the ability to
use these devices access to our internal resources?
The
key differences are that mobile search is browse & go, not sit back and
browse, it is expected to be precise based on location and expectations are
being set by Siri for direct response to the users search queries.
The
second mobile presentation was from Tyler Tate of Twigkat. He focused on direct
UI changes required for mobile search, and was kind enough to post
his presentation on Slideshare as well.
My
presentation focused on practical steps any enterprise search team could
undertake, with minimal budget, to improve the findability of their content. It
focused on the challenges we faced, the solutions we implemented and the results
of those solutions. I have shared this presentation on Slideshare, if you are interested.
The
material was well received. There were a number of thoughtful questions probing
on how to implement the same solutions within other environments and a few
people who were not at the conference have asked for the material based on the
feedback from Twitter and LinkedIn.
