Google Launches Response Feature For Queries That Don't Have Good Matches

Google has launched a response feature that shows when the search query returns less than stellar results. In this instance the engine returns something like "it looks like there aren't great matches for for your search." 

Bad matches are not an alternative for Google. The company would rather not serve a match at all. "It’s definitely not what we want to see happen, and we try to prevent it in a number of ways," Elizabeth Tucker, Google product manager writes in a post. 

This also occurs in other ways across Google Search. For example, if someone misspells a word, Google has systems in place that provide the proper spelling to find the web pages and content that match the query. It also occurs when someone doesn't phrase something correctly. The algorithms try to determine the correct word or concept to find a good match. 

Google began rolling out the new message this week in the U.S. to let searchers know when Google hasn’t been able to find anything that matches for a specific search. The feature when possible also will provide some alternative searches as well as tips on how you could reformulate your query to better find the information you seek.

Some of those tips include refining web searches with different words or symbols.

Google Search typically ignores punctuation that isn’t part of a search operator. The company also suggests not using spaces between the symbol or word and search term. For example, a search for site:nytimes.com will work, but site: nytimes.com won’t.

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