Enterprise Search

Getting access to the right Information, real time is a problem and its getting worse

• “Knowledge” workers spend up to 30% of their time looking for information and, tellingly, only finding it half the time.
• 60%+ of CEOs say they need to do a better job capturing and understanding information in order to make quick business decisions
• 55% of large financial institutions say it is difficult or very difficult to get access to the right business information; 81% would like greater access to timely business information
• 85% of information is unstructured

If you are considering investing in any kind of information management solution, then you need to ensure that you provide your users with an efficient and intelligent search experience. This is why Ixxus developed its own enterprise search methodology – ‘Intelligent Search’.

Search requires expertise and methodology

Search needs an understanding of what problem it is trying to solve, the user's context and use of terminology, how information is classified and processed. It needs context. If you understand this and the content is properly analysed, classified and tagged, you dramatically improve Search's sensitivity and specificity.

This is Intelligent Search™ pioneered by Ixxus.

Ixxus have a strong pedigree in the world of enterprise search; designing, developing and integrating search solutions that have incorporated many of the leading enterprise search technologies on the market to date.

Searching through large volumes of electronic content as well as all the supporting meta-data can be accomplished in many ways. Technologies exist that provide the very simplistic but highly accurate structured queries through to advanced concept matching.

There are many key considerations that should be understood in any search project that are related to the business drivers, such as flexibility of the software, its scalability and the ability to integrate other custom components such as entity extraction.

These elements can effectively short list search systems however; it is only when you drill-down into the specifics of the functionality to identify whether there is a search system that can meet your needs. Distinguishing factors between the main search systems fundamentally relate back to their technological approach to searching.

Below are a few points that our experience has shown us need in-depth analysis, when considering the search element of your project.

• Flexibility is often critical in order that full control over indexing is available to ensure advanced searches can be achieved and it is possible to deal with the combination of incremental content as well as a complete corpus. Providing the search facility over textual content regardless of its format is also a must have requirement.
• Performance & Scalability: Whilst most search systems scale efficiently at low data volumes and data churn rates, if the system was to be deployed on large data volumes (Terabytes) then different approaches would be required which would highlight the strengths of certain vendors;
• Document break-up process for analyzing pertinent information only: Ensuring users only receive the relevant information back and that there are direct links to that information is essential. It is not desirable to be provided a search result of a 10 page document and then find the search result link takes you to the first page rather than to the section that is relevant.
• The mechanism for refining your search parameters without the need to go back to the initial search criteria. Search vendors typically provide ‘more like this’ facilities however more advanced mechanisms do exist with dynamic navigation drill-downs.

So how can Ixxus help you get your approach to enterprise search right?

It probably makes sense to tell you a bit more about our approach.

What is Intelligent Search About?

The Seven Principles of Intelligent Search™

• Principle 1: Search is implicit in all that we do
• Principle 2: Search will only deliver tangible financial returns if looked at from a “line of business” perspective
• Principle 3: Access to the right content (at the right time) is fundamental to the ability to do business
• Principle 4: The content is less important than the knowledge that can be derived from it and how it relates to other content
• Principle 5: Understanding the user and the user’s search context is key
• Principle 6: Search will increasingly require a “rich” client interface, personalised to a user’s needs
• Principle 7; Search will move from “pulling” information via a search box to “pushing” information, real time, to any device

Intelligent Search™ is top-down AND bottom up

A successful approach to delivering results

A successful approach to Intelligent Search requires an approach which is both...

• Top-down business-needs focused and
• Bottom-up architectural needs focused

Without putting these two together, search will never...

• Integrate strategy with structure
• Deliver real benefits
  • Strategic
  • Operational
  • Financial

It is both vertically focussed – or “line of business”.

Shift focus to a search enabled line-of business solution...

Yet requires a organisation-wide view of the solution and information architecture...

...but with enterprise wide structure.

Intelligent Search™ has been created by Ixxus out of its experiences in delivering search related solutions and its knowledge of what is wrong with current solutions in the market place. Ixxus has developed the expertise and methodologies (and proven them!) to provide solutions that deliver and maintain (as volume and complexity grows) the operating performance and financial benefits that good search can offer.