Advanced Search Tier Feature: Direct answers are only available on the Advanced Search tier. Check out the Search Tiers doc to learn more about the features available in each tier.

Direct answers are meant to directly answer a user's question by extracting information from results. There will not be a direct answer for every query, and you determine which fields and data are eligible for a direct answer.

Direct answers are different from searchable fields. Searchable fields control which entities and verticals are returned to the user. Direct answers control how information is extracted from those results to show a direct answer at the top of a results page.

There are two types of direct answers:

• Field Value Direct Answers: come from structured data (you may see this referenced as just "direct answers")
• Featured Snippet Direct Answers: come from unstructured data (you may see this referenced as "featured snippets")

If a direct answer is returned for a search query, it surfaces at the top of results, ahead of any vertical results. Additionally, the vertical it is pulled from is ranked higher than other verticals.

For any given search query, there can only be one direct answer — whether a field value direct answer or featured snippet direct answer — per search, whether universal or vertical. Direct answers return on vertical search the same way they would on universal search.

To configure direct answers in the frontend, see the Direct Answers Theme component doc and DirectAnswer React component reference doc.

Field Value Direct Answers

Field value direct answers respond to user questions directly using fields you designate as eligible, such as a doctor's phone number or a location's address. These direct answers come from structured data. The entire value of the eligible field is returned as the direct answer.

Note: Field value direct answers must be pulled from the first vertical. If you're not seeing a direct answer you expected, first make sure the vertical is returned first.

In the example below, the mainPhone field is enabled as a field value direct answer eligible field for the Restaurants vertical. Running a search for "phone number for new york location" returns the phone number as a direct answer before returning the Restaurants vertical with the relevant entity.

Prediction Mode

Field value direct answers have a Prediction Mode, which allows you to configure how assertive the algorithm is when surfacing a field value direct answer. There are three modes:

• Field Name (Aggressive): The algorithm will show a direct answer whenever it detects an eligible field name, regardless of which entities are returned, if any. This is recommended for single-location businesses. For example, if you are a single-location business and want to surface field value direct answers for queries like "what are your hours?" (where the query does not mention or resolve to a single entity), this will show a direct answer if it detects a populated hours field, regardless of which entities are returned.
• Classifier (Default): The algorithm uses an NLP classifier to decide whether the user is seeking a direct answer.
• One Entity (Conservative): The algorithm shows a direct answer only if the search returns one entity and a field name is detected. In the "phone number for new york location" example above, a direct answer would still be returned if the prediction mode was set to one entity because there is only one location in New York. If there were more locations in New York, more restaurant entities would be returned and a direct answer would not be returned — the user must narrow down their query to specify which New York location they want.

Edit via the Platform UI

1. Navigate to the Verticals screen and choose the desired vertical.
2. Click on the Settings tab. Within the Advanced box, there is a row for each type of direct answer.
3. For field value direct answers, click + Add / Update Fields and select the desired fields.
4. Once at least one eligible field is added, the dropdown for the prediction mode will appear — set it there.

Edit via the JSON Editor

Fields are referenced by their API name. To set a field as eligible for field value direct answers, specify the API name of the field.

The JSON for the Restaurants vertical field value direct answers configuration:

"verticals": {
  "restaurants": {
    "directAnswers": {
      "fieldValues": {
        "eligibleFields": [
          "mainPhone"
        ],
        "predictionMode": "CLASSIFIER"
      }
    }
  }
}

Featured Snippet Direct Answers

Featured snippets extract answers to users' questions from any fields for which the searchable field type document search is activated. These direct answers come from unstructured data such as blogs, help articles, or people bios. Since these fields tend to contain long-form content, featured snippets extract the snippet that best responds to the query.

Users can train the algorithm through experience training by accepting, modifying, or rejecting algorithm-generated featured snippets. Rejected featured snippets will no longer surface in results.

Note: While all verticals may produce featured snippets, the vertical that produced the displayed featured snippet will be pushed to the top of results. That means if you accept a featured snippet through experience training, vertical ranking may be overridden to display the featured snippet's vertical first. If you don't want a featured snippet producing vertical to rank higher, reject that featured snippet.

In the example below, document search is enabled for the Body field of the Help Articles vertical. The test search for "where to redeem gift cards" returns a featured snippet with the answer from the relevant help article.

Prediction Mode

Featured snippets also have a Prediction Mode setting, which lets you choose whether they need to be approved in experience training to be shown to end users. There are two modes:

• Approve Only: The algorithm only shows featured snippets once they are explicitly approved in experience training.
• Allow All (Default): Shows all featured snippets produced by the algorithm without requiring approval. Users can still train the algorithm by rejecting featured snippets they no longer want to show.

Edit via the Platform UI

1. Navigate to the Verticals screen and choose the desired vertical.
2. Click on the Settings tab. Within the Advanced box, there is a section for each type of direct answer.
3. For featured snippet direct answers, set the prediction mode in the given dropdown. Remember to add a field to the document search algorithm first.

Edit via the JSON Editor

To set a field as eligible for featured snippets, add the field to the searchableFields object and set documentSearch to true.

Then under the directAnswers object, set the predictionMode value for featuredSnippets. If you have not yet edited the prediction mode, the directAnswers object will not appear in the JSON file — in that case it defaults to ALLOW_ALL.

The JSON for the Help Articles vertical featured snippet direct answers configuration:

"verticals": {
  "help_articles": {
    "directAnswers": {
      "featuredSnippets": {
        "predictionMode": "ALLOW_ALL"
      }
    }
  }
}