14 DAY TRIAL // The latest step in the evolution of Microsoft’s search/decision engine involves a deeper integration of two of Bing’s features, Autosuggest and Query History. Essentially, the Redmond company has concluded that the search process could do with a boost if users are able to cut the time it takes to perform repetitive searches. As of the start of May, Bing has grown with the addition of support for query history in Autosuggest. Users will be able to see that Bing’s Autosuggest not only returns now suggestions based on the terms of their search, but it is also capable of delivering similar items gathered from Query History.
“Many users search for a set of topics again and again. It could be you searching on your favorite hobbies, doing online research, looking up local attractions or directions – the particular query subjects are very specific to you. To make searching easier and reduce all those wasted clicks, many people found our history feature very useful to get them to where they’re going faster. So we experimented with providing your prior searches in Autosuggest and found it’s even more useful in to helping find what you’re looking for faster,” Bing’s Robert Williams and Todd Schwartz revealed.
The Autosuggest feature works by showing a pop-up with query items immediately below the search field, providing suggestions related to the text entered by the user. Microsoft has worked to separate plain vanilla suggestions delivered by the search engine from previous search queries in Autosuggest, by marking the latter in purple, namely the same color that browsers generally associated with visited links.
Users will have to choose between allowing the new feature or using Autosuggest in the same manner as before. Bing comes with a range of comprehensive Query History management options, which put the end users in control. This is, of course, to help customers protect their privacy. History can be switched on and off via the Manage History option. At the same time, Bing gives users the option to delete certain areas of their search history.
“Search history in Autosuggest can help you in other ways too. Many search tasks span multiple search sessions even days or weeks. In fact, 44% of non-navigational search sessions last longer than 1 week! Perhaps you need to research the purchase of a new automobile. You might use Bing to find a retail location and to further research online – over many days – to make the best decisions on your big ticket purchase. With history support in Autosuggest, you can restart a previous search session by typing a few characters to see your previous queries and start researching right where you left off. We know from our testing that this makes you more effective at your longer search tasks,” Schwartz added.
