Google Search Appliance Getting the Most from Your Google Search Appliance - Manual (Page 60)

Google Search Appliance: Getting the Most from Your Google Search Appliance Search Experience 60
Collecting Metrics about User Clicks
The Google Search Appliance’s advanced search reporting feature enables you to gather information
about user clicks on search results. By using advanced search reporting, you can determine if:
• Users a finding what they’re searching for
• Groups of users are searching for the same information
• Certain URLs are harder for users to find than others
By analyzing user clicks, you can also identify ways to improve the search experience.
For example, suppose information about user clicks shows that a users in range of IP addresses are all
searching for information about a project with the code name of “Antilles.” None of the users are finding
a satisfactory URL at the top of the search results. Some of the users are finding a satisfactory URL on
page 3 of the results. However, many users are abandoning the search after viewing page 2 of the
results.
The range of IP addresses tells you that the users who are searching for the results are all Engineers in
the U.S. who are working on project Antilles. You might create a front end for this group of users and
force results about project Antilles to the top of the results using KeyMatches (see “Forcing Specific
Documents to the Top of Search Results” on page 34).
Once you enable advanced search reporting, the search appliance modifies search result pages by
inserting code that tracks all links that a user clicks. From that point on, when a user clicks a link in the
search results, those selections are tracked for analysis later on.
You can export an advanced search report. Each entry in an advanced search report represents a single
user click or other action, such as page load, in the search appliance user interface.
The reports provide rich search behavior information such as:
• The position of the result end-users are choosing
• Which queries are not getting any clicks
• How often a user is clicking on a KeyMatch as opposed to a OneBox
Setting Up Advanced Search Reporting
Set up advanced search reporting by performing the following steps with the Admin Console:
1. Enabling advanced search reporting on the Search > Search Features > Front Ends > Output
Format page.
2. Exporting an advanced search report on the Reports > Search Log page.
Learn More about Advanced Search Reporting
For in-depth information about setting up and using advanced search reporting, refer to the following
Google Search Appliance documentation:
• “Gathering Information about the Search Experience” in Creating the Search Experience
• Search Protocol Reference