Avi Rappoport, the Principal Consultant, is an authority on site,
Intranet and topical portal search engines. She combines
research in information retrieval with years in the software industry to bring
a practical and straightforward approach to web search and navigation issues.
Rather than assaulting you with jargon, I want to work with you
to make sure that you get the best tools and the fewest problems. Solutions
are tailored to your organizational needs and budget, from relatively small
sites to giant portals and Intranets. I am very user-focused and practical, using technology to that end. I often consult
by telephone, email and instant messaging-- no travel expenses required. Special
packages and rates for non-profit organizations are available.
Search Tools Consulting Options
Needs Analysis
Working with you to create a simple overview of your or document collection, and up to a full specification process involving personas and scenarios.
Product Selection
Helping you select the search tool that best fits your needs and your
budget.
Implementation
Working with web production or IT
staff to install and configure a search engine, adapt to site-specific content issues, and design
the user interface. Using iterative design to catch unanticipated problems.
Training and Documentation
Customizing instruction and documentation
for search administration staff.
Continuing and Incremental Improvements
Analyzing of existing search engine via user testing, surveys, and log analysis, recommending
specific changes.
Maintenance
Keeping your search system up and running, reports and metrics, Search Suggestions management, search
engine tuning for best results.
For my conference presentations, articles and technical documents, see the publications
listing.
KCM - information needs analysis, evaluation of the PostgreSQL full-text search module, research on scanning services, OCR, named entity extraction and semantic analysis, best practices for search functionality and results page interface customized to specific information system requirements.
ProQuest - extensive research on current data content & interchange standards
Yodle - research and recommendations for geographic local search using the Solr Lucene search engine.
Cengage - faceted metadata search consulting
United States Library of Congress - extensive analysis of current and future search requirements,
metadata integration, user experience improvements, and recommendations.
Librarian's Index to the Internet - develop specifications and advice on choice of faceted metadata search and browse.
VeriSign - search engine consulting and configuration for main site, international sites,
intranets and sales extranet (2.5 years).
Discovery Education - analysis of multimedia search and
architecture requirements.
Virtuoso - analysis and consulting for database-backed travel site.
Hewlett-Packard - extensive analysis and recommendations for very large intranet search.
Blue Shield of California - search engine requirements analysis and implementation.
QwestDex - online yellow pages, local search, faceted metadata search RFI, RFP and vendor recommendation.
MIT - site search advice
Proctor & Gamble - intranet search evaluation
Librarian's Index to the Internet -
search user interface and spellchecker
Hewlett-Packard - log file analysis and search implementation analysis for a very large public web site
National Cancer Institute - help choosing a portal search engine
Epson America - research on filtering engines
AlterNet - search engine for a growing topical portal
Search Tools Consulting's principal analyst, Avi Rappoport, may be available to help you with selection, indexing and search log analysis, as well as relevance evaluation, user experience testing, and functional search engine work. Please contact us for more information.
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