Managed search geo search

November 11, 2024

Kevin Montgomery

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3 min. read

Effective geo search can help connect website visitors to in-person solutions and services, delivering highly relevant search results based on location data.

Beyond Keyword Search – Searching Geolocation Data

Search helps visitors find content on your website, but effective and helpful search experiences include so much more – such as directing customers to stores or offices near them, returning relevant results for their specific location, finding locations based on nearby points of interest and more.

Adding geospatial search features help bridge the gap between digital and real-world experiences – but geospatial data can be difficult to work with and even harder to search. Fortunately, SearchStax makes geospatial search easier with Managed Search and Solr.

What is Geospatial Search?

Geospatial search typically includes indexing, searching and returning information about properties, locations, buildings, population data and other relevant information tied to or associated with a specific physical location.

Geospatial search with Managed Search

Geospatial data can include any of the following:

  • A specific point by latitude and longitude
  • A geographic area bound by a box or other shape (e.g. counties or states)
  • A specific street address – typically geocoded to a specific latitude/longitude or bounding box

It can also include data associated with a geographic point or area, such as tax rates, sun exposure, climate or local geography. Geospatial information could also include direction and routing information such as local transit authority, clearance and access information and temporal information such as road closures and weather conditions.

How to Find Entities on a Map

Geo search use cases often include finding a specific point on a map and getting relevant data (“when does the pizza place down the street close”), locating items within a specific area (“pizza places open in New York”) and finding locations based on specific criteria (“rentals with a hot tub near skiing”) among many others.

Executing these searches involves processing geospatial queries to extract place names, streets, addresses, and other location-based information from user input.

  • Extract place names, streets, addresses and other location-based information from a search query
  • Geocode to specific latitude and longitude coordinates and/or bounding box
  • Search for entities within matching area
  • Filter/sort search results as needed
  • Add related results for nearby or similar locations

Challenges of Working with Geospatial Data

Geospatial data can be difficult to work with and keep up to date because of the demand for accuracy from data sources and search intent that can be inconsistent. Data and information about specific locations can be extensive and cover a variety of topics and categories while changing and updating often and unpredictably.

Managed Search for Geo Search

SearchStax Managed Search provides a robust and flexible Solr development environment for building, testing and scaling geo-search. Managed Search includes easily scalable infrastructure as well as security and data backup features to ensure your geosearch experience stays functional and secure.

Managed Search infrastructure can be deployed in major cloud providers in most regions so you can easily deploy and replicate geo data and search features near your users.

Geospatial Data and Solr

Solr includes robust geospatial indexing and search features that easily searches millions of property documents and keeps them updated rapidly. Managed Search provides customizable Solr instances that can be easily replicated, scaled and distributed across multiple cloud regions so that your geo-search features work quickly and reliably.

How do I build Geospatial Search with Managed Search?

Managed Search provides stable, scalable and predictable environments to develop, test and deploy large scale reliable search as part of your product.

SearchStax built Managed Search to provide the power and flexibility of Solr technology with the management, availability and scalability backed by our 24/7 support team, robust fault protection and more. We’re making it easier to build custom search solutions using Solr with predictable infrastructure management, resilience and cost controls.

 

“For us, it’s comforting to know that we have stability in our Solr platform, and relying on the experts at SearchStax saves us a lot of time in sorting out problems with our Solr infrastructure.”

Darren Webb
Head of Development, Kagool

See how Barratt Homes and their agency, Kagool, migrated to Managed Search for improved geospatial search

Getting Started with Managed Search

Schedule a Demo to learn more about Managed Search and how you can build reliable, scalable search experiences without the headaches of infrastructure management. Talk to our search experts to learn more about scalable search infrastructure management and how Managed Search can help your team build, deliver and optimize geospatial search.

Start Now for Free

Try Managed Search for 14 days and see how easily you scale geospatial search.

By Kevin Montgomery

Product Marketing Engineer

Managed Search provides the search infrastructure and platform needed to build bespoke high volume geospatial search.

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