{"id":125,"date":"2012-12-06T03:25:28","date_gmt":"2012-12-06T08:25:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/?p=125"},"modified":"2017-11-09T11:55:47","modified_gmt":"2017-11-09T16:55:47","slug":"ebay-wildcard-search-article-from-ebay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/2012\/12\/ebay-wildcard-search-article-from-ebay\/","title":{"rendered":"eBay Wildcard Search article from eBay"},"content":{"rendered":"
This is an article from eBay about the wildcard depreciation.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
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As we’ve previously announced, eBay is deprecating wildcard queries from search, including web and mobile search, saved searches, and API calls to search. We’ve been working with our Product Team to create documentation around best practices and how you can best move your business forward.<\/span><\/p>\n

Wildcard queries include an asterisk (*) \u00a0with their keyword search: The asterisk is intended to match all words starting with the letters in the wildcarded word. For example, the keyword search \u00a0dress*<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0would include in the search results listings with any of the following in their titles: \u00a0dress, dresses, dresser, dressers, dressing, dressel<\/em>, \u00a0dressage, dressup<\/em>,\u00a0 etc. in their title in the search results.<\/span><\/p>\n

Only ~0.35% of eBay queries contain wildcards, but they take \u00a0a disproportionally high amount of capacity to support. \u00a0\u00a0The impact of\u00a0wildcard\u00a0queries can have a significant impact on the responsiveness of the site to all user searches, especially at peak times.\u00a0 This impact is why the industry practice, in both web and commerce search industries, is not to support\u00a0wildcards\u00a0of this type. \u00a0Instead, they follow the same approach as eBay in providing automatic query rewriting, which captures the intent of the user query and matches it to items. \u00a0In addition, advanced search operators such as exclusion and phrasing are provided for users who want finer-grained control over their queries.<\/span><\/p>\n

Writing effective search queries without wildcards<\/span><\/p>\n

There are two approaches to searching without wildcards.<\/span><\/p>\n

The first is to search using a simple keyword search query. \u00a0eBay is continually improving query processing\u00a0to make it simpler for users to find what they want. \u00a0After being processed, a query can include many variants of the original words as well as\u00a0<\/strong>being\u00a0expanded through categories or other item-related data. \u00a0For example, if the user typed \u00a0gucci handbags<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0as the query,\u00a0processing could alter that query\u00a0<\/strong>to search for \u00a0(gucci or Brand:Gucci) and (handbag or handbags or purse or purses or Category:Handbags)<\/em>. \u00a0 In many cases, searches that used wildcards a year ago can now be run more effectively as keyword queries.<\/span><\/p>\n

Consider the query \u00a0anne klein scar*<\/em>. \u00a0The intent\u00a0of this query was to retrieve Anne Klein scarves regardless of whether the seller used\u00a0\u00a0scarf<\/em>,\u00a0,\u00a0<\/strong>\u00a0scarves<\/em>, or \u00a0scarfs \u00a0<\/em>in the item title. \u00a0However, the simple keyword query \u00a0anne klein scarf<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0retrieves all of these items plus items listed in the scarf categories, which may not have the word \u00a0scarf<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0or \u00a0scarves<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0in the title. \u00a0Plus it has the advantage of not including items with \u00a0Anne Klein<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0and \u00a0scarlet<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0in the title (e.g., scarlet handbags and jackets): these items would have been returned by the wildcard query. \u00a0 As another example, the query\u00a0\u00a0ruffl* curtain*<\/em>\u00a0 can be replaced by the simple keyword query \u00a0ruffled curtains \u00a0<\/em>and will return all items with \u00a0ruffle<\/em>, \u00a0ruffled<\/em>, or \u00a0ruffles<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0in the title that also have the word \u00a0curtain<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0or \u00a0curtains<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0in the title or that are in the curtains category.<\/span><\/p>\n

The second approach to searching without wildcards applies\u00a0<\/strong>to\u00a0complex advanced queries. In these cases, the most straightforward way to replace a wildcard is by listing the words separated by commas\u00a0and enclosed in parentheses. \u00a0For example, if\u00a0<\/strong>your\u00a0query was\u00a0\u00a0lego minifig* -lot* \u00a0<\/em>you can rewrite\u00a0it as \u00a0lego (minifigure, minifigures) -(lot, lots) \u00a0<\/em>or as \u00a0lego (minifigure, minifigures) -lot -lots. \u00a0<\/em>This query will match items with the words \u00a0lego<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0and either \u00a0minifigure<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0or \u00a0minifigures<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0but without \u00a0lot<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0or \u00a0lots<\/em>. \u00a0The parentheses () list alternatives. \u00a0 The minus sign – excludes words.<\/span><\/p>\n

In general, the advanced search operators (https:\/\/pages.ebay.com\/help\/search\/advanced-search.html#using<\/a>) such as exclusion, option lists, and phrasing can all be used to fine-tune queries. \u00a0For example, to further constrain the results, a query can contain double quotes ” ” to force the words in the quotes to appear next to each other and in that order. \u00a0If the user is looking for a filter for a coffee maker, using the phrased query\u00a0\u00a0“coffee maker filter”<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0will return only items with those three words in that order in the title; this query will exclude items\u00a0<\/strong>that\u00a0are coffee makers with filters.<\/span><\/p>\n

Note that advanced queries do not undergo any of the automatic expansions that simple keyword queries do. \u00a0So, the query for coffee maker filters would need to be written as \u00a0(“coffee maker filter”, “coffee maker filters”)<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0in order to get the rewrite from \u00a0filter<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0to \u00a0filters<\/em>—\u00a0which would have been included automatically for a simple query. Likewise, the previous advanced search example requires both\u00a0minifigure<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0minifigures<\/em>, as well as\u00a0-lot<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0-lots.<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

Our recommendation to our users is\u00a0<\/strong>this: First\u00a0try simple keyword queries, easily combined with category and other constraints such as price. \u00a0Only if that is not fine-grained enough, move to advanced operator queries.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n
To update your searches, go to:<\/span><\/div>\n
https:\/\/AutomatedSearches.com<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n
\u00a0<\/span><\/div>\n
If you have any questions,\u00a0<\/span>please comment below.<\/span><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Thank You,<\/span><\/div>\n
Dave Moniz<\/span><\/div>\n
AutomatedSearches.com<\/span><\/div>\n
https:\/\/AutomatedSearches.com<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is an article from eBay about the wildcard depreciation. As we’ve previously announced, eBay is deprecating wildcard queries from search, including web and mobile search, saved searches, and API calls to search. We’ve been working with our Product Team to create documentation around best practices and how you can best move your business forward. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-125","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ebay"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=125"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":273,"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/125\/revisions\/273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=125"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=125"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automatedsearches.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=125"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}