Integrating a search engine into your site

[mandy]

It's a universal frustration. You just know that the piece of information you're looking for is somewhere on a site. You click one link, then another, and another. You go back to the home page and try a different branch of the site. After dozens of clicks, you still can't find the information you need. Then it's back to Google and on to another site. At last you find one with an internal search engine. You enter your search term, and voilá!--the information you need pops up in less than a second.

If you want your visitors to have "voilá!" moments, consider incorporating an internal search engine into your web site. Search tools not only make your information easily accessible, but they also increase the time visitors spend on your site. An internal search engine may be a necessity if your site has more than 100 pages of content, if it is deeply hierarchical, or if its architecture is weak. If the purpose of your site is to provide in-depth information on a variety of specific topics, it's ineffective to force a visitor to browse through your site to find the information he seeks. Even if you have designed your site to bring users pleasure through browsing, it's still a good idea to give your visitor an effective option for finding something specific...

full article: http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/php/2006/02/...wdown.html