What is Guided Search?
Guided Search is an advanced search capability in Digital Asset Management (DAM) systems that helps users quickly locate the right content in complex asset repositories. It combines semantic understanding, natural language processing (NLP), and visual similarity search with intelligent recommendations and automated filtering.
Unlike traditional keyword search, which relies on exact, nearby, or broad text matches, Guided Search interprets the intent behind a user’s query and dynamically applies filters or recommends related assets. This ensures marketers, creatives, and distributed teams can find the exact content they need in seconds, even when managing millions of assets across global repositories.
What Are the Benefits of Guided Search?
Semantic Search: Understands queries in natural language (e.g., “medical brochure for cardiology”) and surfaces the most relevant results.
Visual Similarity: Finds assets based on imagery, colors, or visual patterns when words fall short.
Intent-Based Filtering: Applies or suggests filters automatically, such as campaign type, region, or format, based on query intent.
Faster Discovery: Reduces time spent searching across large repositories, increasing productivity for marketing and creative teams.
Content Reuse: Surfaces related and recommended assets, improving reuse rates and maximizing ROI from existing content.
Accuracy at Scale: Handles repositories with millions of digital assets, ensuring users can pinpoint exactly what they need without duplicate searches.
Frequently Asked Questions
How is Guided Search different from regular search?
Regular search relies on exact keywords and can return irrelevant or incomplete results if users don’t know the right terms. Guided Search, on the other hand, uses semantic understanding, natural language processing, and visual similarity to interpret the intent behind a query. It can recommend and even apply filters automatically, surfacing the most relevant assets without requiring users to guess file names or metadata tags.
Does Guided Search work with both text and images?
Yes. Guided Search combines semantic text search with visual similarity recognition, making it possible to search using descriptions, keywords, or even example images.
Can Guided Search recommend assets I didn’t know I needed?
Absolutely. Guided Search not only retrieves exact matches but also recommends related assets, campaigns, or variations that align with user intent, eliminating missed opportunities.