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A New Dimension to Search

Instructions for using a search engine: Type in a keyword. The search engine comes back with results. Then scan through them one by one until you find what you’re looking for. 

That’s how search engines are used, right?

And it works fine. In most cases. Kinda. 

Really, a search engine user has only two options. Reject a result “it’s not what I’m looking for” and scan on. Or accept a result “that’s it” and press on it. 

How about results that are close to what you’re looking for but not quite it. What if you could cue the search engine “this result is relevant, show me more like it”? How much better will search become? 

All major search and recommendation engines are one dimensional with a single direction. Scan from top to bottom or on a carousel from left to right. Kluster presents search on two dimensions and the users can move in multiple direction. It can be used for any type of visual search: pictures, gifs, book covers, paintings, merchandize and more. 

How it works: Initial results are laid-out in a dial form, with the most relevant on top and the rest proceeding clockwise. User can expand the result set by selecting one of the initial results. That generates a new search results and generates a new dial. Or the user can continue scrolling by rotating the dial. 

Here's how it looks, and the interactions a user has with the results: 

When the user taps on a result to see more results like it, a new dial opens:



The user can keep expanding results, move around the canvas and zoom in and out. 

Wouldn't this make for a better search? 
Check out http://www.klustersearch.com and https://www.facebook.com/klustersearch/

NOTE: some search engines have a find similar option, but it opens a new search page. Here the user can retain a map of the search journey. 

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