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Bing Shopping Incorporates Natural Language Search

If you search for “cashmere sweaters under $100” on Bing or Bing Shopping, the search engine now understands what you mean, returning results for products in the category under the price point specified. Microsoft announced the ability to recognize price constraints today, describing the innovation as “a small step in our journey to make search […]

Pamela Parker on March 1, 2011 at 4:09 pm | Reading time: 1 minute

If you search for “cashmere sweaters under $100” on Bing or Bing Shopping, the search engine now understands what you mean, returning results for products in the category under the price point specified. Microsoft announced the ability to recognize price constraints today, describing the innovation as “a small step in our journey to make search friendlier to natural language queries.”

Similar searches on Google Product Search don’t return appropriate results.

So far, the change will only apply to prices, and only to U.S.-based searches. However, it does work for mobile searches. Mobile searches for products are widely expected to grow, as shoppers in retail stores do price comparisons and look for reviews online.

Microsoft said it has built the engine so that it can be scaled to other natural language queries in time.

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About the author

Pamela Parker

Pamela Parker is Research Director at Third Door Media's Content Studio, where she produces MarTech Intelligence Reports and other in-depth content for digital marketers in conjunction with Search Engine Land and MarTech. Prior to taking on this role at TDM, she served as Content Manager, Senior Editor and Executive Features Editor. Parker is a well-respected authority on digital marketing, having reported and written on the subject since its beginning. She's a former managing editor of ClickZ and has also worked on the business side helping independent publishers monetize their sites at Federated Media Publishing. Parker earned a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University.