What Is Semantic Search?

Let's say you are looking for something online. You might be looking for a new recipe or want to learn more about a subject. You type in a few keywords and hit "Enter." Before you know it, a long list of search results appears. Here's the thing: sometimes, these search results differ from what you sought. They may need to be more specific or get to the heart of your desire. So, semantic search comes into play. At its heart, semantic search is all about knowing what the words you use mean. More than matching keywords is needed; you must also know their meaning and why. It's like having a search engine fluent in human language and can understand the subtleties and complexities of what we say. So how does it work? Well, it's all because of "natural language processing" (NLP). NLP is a fancy name for the technology that helps computers understand human language. It's what makes Siri and Alexa work, and it's also how semantic search works. When you type a search query, the search engine uses natural language processing (NLP) to figure out what words and phrases you used. It looks at the context of the terms and tries to figure out what you are looking for. For example, if you type "best pizza places near me," the search engine doesn't just look for websites that mention the words "pizza" and "places." It tries to figure out that you want suggestions for good pizza places that are close by. Once the search engine knows what you're looking for better, it can give you more accurate and helpful search results. It could even answer your question without you having to go to another website. So why does this matter? Well, it can save you time and trouble, for one thing. You don't have to look through search results pages to find what you want. It can also lead you to new ideas and information that you might have yet to find any other way. For businesses and websites, it can help them find the right people interested in what they offer and connect with them. All of this is easy to say but hard to do. NLP is a complicated field constantly changing, with many problems to solve. As machine learning and artificial intelligence get better, we're getting closer and closer to a world where the semantic search is the norm. So the next time you look for something online, remember there's much more going on than matching keywords. With semantic search, your search engine tries hard to figure out what you're looking for, which is pretty cool.