September 21, 2005

In an effort to have its users find local businesses with fewer clicks, Yahoo has launched Quick Links.

These days, search has become such a fact of life, that most people take it for granted.

But it seems like every week I'm reminded why its so much fun working on a search engine that is used daily by millions of people, and most importantly by friends and neighbors and that lady in the store down the street.

Take, for instance, last week: I was out for coffee at the local Starbucks when the guy ahead of us in the line had lost the piece of paper with directions to the restaurant he was meeting friends at ... and I was extremely happy to show him this:

So not only did it take me just one search to get the address and phone number, but now he has the listing and directions right on his cell phone.

What was that? It is a new feature in our abstract generating algorithm that tries to guess the most used information about that page, and promotes it into the summaries for search results.

Not only do we try to figure out the most used information on the page, but we also integrate relevant features from other parts of Yahoo.

For instance, in the example above, you can see that we have found Maps & Reviews on Yahoo! Local, and also found that Yahoo! Local can send the address and phone number to your mobile phone - so thats there too!

But of course, its not always just content from Yahoo! - we also use content from the site itself if that's more relevant - try searching for Wal-Mart or 511 or FedEx...

Try it out. And perhaps next time you need directions for that restaurant, or suddenly crave some ice-cream (or coffee), or want a quick look to see if you won the lottery, and maybe (just maybe) see if the lottery money somehow made it into your bank account Yahoo! Search might have the answer right there for you.

Source: Yahoo Blog

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