New ChurchofJesusChrist.org Search Harnesses Power of Google

Contributed By By Camille West, ChurchofJesusChrist.org News and Events

Article Highlights The Church has revamped the search function and features to include Google’s powerful search technology.

Users report it is easier to locate Church resources they need for callings, personal study, and teaching at home or church.

To use the search engine, locate the search box at the top of any ChurchofJesusChrist.org page, or go to search.ChurchofJesusChrist.org.

“If it’s on ChurchofJesusChrist.org and you can find it using Google search, you can now find it using the ChurchofJesusChrist.org search. The results will be the same.” —Mark Ward, senior product manager

If you gave up using the search engine on ChurchofJesusChrist.org a long time ago, it’s time to try it again.

The Church has revamped the search function and features to include Google’s powerful search technology, harnessing its signature ability to find relevant information.

The change has increased the use of ChurchofJesusChrist.org search by 61 percent since its introduction three months ago, and users are reporting that it is much easier to locate Church resources they need for callings, personal study, and teaching at home or church.

“If it’s on ChurchofJesusChrist.org and you can find it using Google search, you can now find it using the ChurchofJesusChrist.org search,” said Mark Ward, senior product manager for ChurchofJesusChrist.org search. “The results will be the same.”

All Church Websites

The search engine doesn’t just search ChurchofJesusChrist.org, however. It will also search through content on more than 20 other official Church websites such asmormon.org or josephsmithpapers.org. This is no small accomplishment considering ChurchofJesusChrist.org alone is the world’s largest religious website with more than 32 million unique visitors looking at 735 million pages annually.

Official, Safe Content

The new search provides a more safe and Church-specific search experience than Google, said Brother Ward. When you search from Google’s website, the results you get back may or may not be official content, he explained. Some results might be links to members’ personal blogs or even anti-Church sites.

The ChurchofJesusChrist.org search, however, only returns links to official Church-approved content that is currently available on ChurchofJesusChrist.org and other Church websites. And even though Google’s technology is used, no user information is provided back to Google. “It provides a safe, private, shock-free environment to search for approved gospel resources,” said Brother Ward.

In other words, parents won’t need to worry that they or their children might stumble onto inappropriate content listed in other search engine results.

Plus, ChurchofJesusChrist.org search understands word usage unique to the Church, said David Crockett, project manager for search. “It recognizes that the wordfriend is also a magazine, and Monson is referring to the prophet, President Thomas S. Monson,” he said. That’s something Google and other search engines can’t do as well.

“The new ChurchofJesusChrist.org search really combines the best of both worlds,” said Brother Ward.

Multiple Search Options

To use the search engine, locate the search box at the top of any ChurchofJesusChrist.org page, or go tosearch.ChurchofJesusChrist.org.

If you know the content you’re searching for is from general conference, you can either include the words “general conference” in the search bar, select “General Conference” from the list of categories on the left, or go to the General Conference page and use the search bar there.

Organized by Categories

A new feature of ChurchofJesusChrist.org search not typically found in other search engines is the grouping of results into categories: general conference, broadcasts, magazines, manuals, images, videos, scriptures, music, news and events, topics, Church websites, and people. This makes preparing talks and lessons easier when you can see the different categories of content that are available.

Images in Results

Many results include an image, which provides a visual cue to what the content is, making it easier for you to quickly spot the content you’re looking for.

Auto-Complete

One helpful feature Google users will recognize is auto-complete. As you type, a screen pops up with suggested phrases that other people have frequently entered. “It makes it even easier to narrow down your searches,” said Brother Ward.

Built-In Advanced Search Features

One feature you may notice is missing is advanced search. That is because many of the advanced search capabilities most users want are now built in to the basic search function, said Brother Ward.

For example, if you want to find talks or articles by President Thomas S. Monson on faith published in the Ensign magazine during 2012, simply enter the words Monson faith ensign 2012 into the search bar. The first set of results you’ll see are broad, Google-like results. The results that follow are grouped into categories.

Any time you want to refine your search, simply click on a category to the left of the search results.

Some serious researchers may still miss some of the advanced search functions, such as date ranges, but these features may be included in future releases of ChurchofJesusChrist.org search, Brother Ward said.

More Search Helps

Search tips have been added to ChurchofJesusChrist.org/search to help you learn how to make your searches on ChurchofJesusChrist.org the most productive. One tip is to enclose exact phrases you’re searching for in quotation marks. This tells the search engine to search for content containing that exact phrase, not just the separate words. Select “Read More” to find ahelp page with video tutorials.

“Play around with it,” Brother Crockett encouraged. “We think you’ll find there’s a big improvement in being able to find what you need.”