[WEB4LIB] How are people using your "Site Search"?

[Thomas Bennett]

In some cases ( and probably very many)  I think it is indistinguishable to
say whether they meant to search the opac or the site.  Take for instance
the first two below.  Not being a librarian, I would have thought that the
first two would be meant for the opac not our site but there are 6 pages
returned for the first and 2 pages returned for the second.  Although when I
tried the search myself the number of results were quite different, zero
returned for each of the first two and eighteen pages for the third.  These
are results from searches today.

Query    Distinct Queries   Results pages
the conspiracy of byron  3  6
lynette jennings  2  2
electronic copy  2  2
Watauga Democrat  2  2
indoor stock car racing  2  2
Archaeological Investigations in the Watauga Reservoir  2  2
the insatiate countess  2  3
watterson  2  2
axp  1  1
telnet  1  1

We use Google's site search for searching our site.  For Universities there
is no charge.  The feature includes reports that can be viewed.  When
viewing the report, clicking on the number of hits for that day goes to a
page that shows the terms that were searched on.

Thomas

-----Original Message-----
From: web4lib at webjunction.org
[mailto:web4lib at webjunction.org]On Behalf Of Blake Carver
Sent: Monday, February 18, 2002 2:53 PM
To: Multiple recipients of list
Subject: [WEB4LIB] How are people using your "Site Search"?


Is anyone else is keeping a log of what search terms people are entering in
your "Site Search". I recall a "how to" thread a few weeks back, but I
don't see any discussion on what visitors are using our site-only search
engine for, or how they are misusing it.

I've been keeping track here at OSU for a few months now, and there is no
doubt in my mind people are NOT differentiating between a site search and a
search of our OPAC, or a database search.
People see "search", and think they can just search for anything. This
makes sense from a users point of view, why would someone be able to search
the library site and not be able to turn up some books? It may seem silly
to us, but this is how people are looking at our sites, they see the
library, and they want to search for a book.

I changed our search screen to state explicitly that our site search is not
looking for books, etc... about a month ago, and it doesn't seem to have
helped.

So, are you watching the logs, what have you seen, and have you found a way
to help users get pointed  in the right direction?

Some recent examples:
  how many libraries are there at OSU
  the history of the columbiana county courthouse in Lisbon Ohio
  Am searching for Howard Johnson who migrated to the united states in
1995-96
Books in Spanish Christian Cultural Anthropology
McCarthyism during Cold War dealing with actors and actresses

------------------------------------------
Blake Carver
Web Librarian
The Ohio State University Libraries
carver.50 at osu.edu
See Also:
   http://www.lisnews.com