What is Smart Search and How Does it Work?

Nikita M.

Media-savvy content creator, with a curiosity for all Salesforce experiences.

Updated: Aug 12th, 2025

We have all heard of how slow customer service can be, even in our digital-first era. However, support agents can’t be blamed for slow tech or systems that don’t provide the correct information when prompted. Thankfully, poking around a knowledge base searching for the right answers is a thing of the past for support agents who have the opportunity to work with smart search systems. 

Are you interested in finding out more about this type of technology that can elevate experiences for customer-facing teams? Join us in the article below, we want to discuss smart search systems.

What is Smart Search? 

It’s a term used to describe “search systems” that are supercharged with the following advanced technology:

Machine Learning (ML)

Natural Language Processing (NLP)

Artificial Intelligence (AI)

It’s better than previous search systems as it now includes the following capabilities:

Semantic Search

Intelligent Search

Cognitive Search

One of the reasons why the tech industry needed to improve its previous search systems was to help users correctly find what they were looking for faster. These technologies are smart and they examine a user’s objective, their previous interactions with the system, and the themes of questions offered. 

The powerful examination of multiple factors enables smart search systems to give users, like customers or employees, more accurate and relevant information instantly. 

How Does Smart Search Work?

It leverages ML, NLP, and AI to get a better understanding of what a person is asking the system and then provides more accurate answers to them. Let’s take a look at the table below to see how each tech advancement contributes to smart search systems. 

Looking at the capabilities of smart search systems, it seems businesses could use the tech to build personalized digital experiences or interactions that mimic physical ones for customers. And when it comes to internal operations, smart search systems could help employees find the information they need quickly to deliver elevated customer services. 

Essential Smart Search Capabilities

Now more than ever, we have access to information almost instantly thanks to the internet connecting data to people. However, searching for the right information in the sea of data can take a lot of time. 

Smart search systems tackle this issue by returning relevant information to the people who have asked a question. The hope is that the results from smart search systems reduce the amount of time people spend searching through vast amounts of information in knowledge bases or databases. 

So, let’s dive deeper and explore smart search tech capabilities! 

1. Conversational Understanding

Conversational understanding empowers a smart search system to interpret natural language questions asked by a person. And we all know that when we ask a search system one question, we have to ask more when exploring a passionate topic or are seeking specific products to purchase.

Therefore, conversations between a person and a smart search system are known to continuously flow. Nevertheless, a person always has a goal when interacting with a smart search system and has learned to ask popular search terms to get closer to the results they want.

This is where conversational understanding in a smart system can examine the context of the interaction and respond to a person with more accurate answers. 

2. Natural Language Processing

Although people have learned popular queries to interact better with search systems, there are times when they do not have the right keywords. In these cases, irrelevant information can be returned, and the querent is either misinformed or gives up. 

Now, smart search systems leverage the power of NLP and ML to truly understand what people are asking. So, customer service agents can simply ask a question without “stop words” and have accurate responses returned. 

For example, a customer support agent might ask the smart search system, “Open account,” instead of “How can I open an account?” The smart search system will be able to pull up all the requirements from a connected knowledge base, allowing the customer support agent to quickly and professionally continue their task with a customer. 

3. Responsive Software

The responsive power of smart search systems makes these advanced tools adapt to conversations and connect with people faster than before. People enjoy interacting with systems and apps not only through local computers but also mobile phones, gaming consoles, televisions, tablets, and other high-tech devices. 

For this reason, smart search systems now need to be responsive and dynamic across platforms and operating systems. 

Wrapping Up Smart Search 

That concludes our discussion on smart search technology. We hope we have given you the information you require to understand this tech better. In this article, we covered what smart search is, how it works, and a few of its features that give people the potential to find more accurate results. 

If there is a topic you want to explore with regards to smart search technology, please feel free to reach out to us. We would love to discuss your ideas and support you with any software solutions, especially those that connect to Salesforce.

For our customers, here are a few articles you might find useful when working with Titan’s search functionality:

• Search Settings
• Configure on Search Action
• Variant of Search Element
• Translation Search Capabilities

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