Recommendations and Results Organization in Netflix Search
This work aims to improve search functionality for Netflix users by adapting existing recommendation methods, representing an incremental advancement in personalization.
The paper addresses the challenge of improving Netflix Search by moving beyond keyword-matching to better satisfy user intents, proposing to integrate personalized recommendation techniques from the Homepage into Search to enhance result organization and user value.
Personalized recommendations on the Netflix Homepage are based on a user's viewing habits and the behavior of similar users. These recommendations, organized for efficient browsing, enable users to discover the next great video to watch and enjoy without additional input or an explicit expression of their intents or goals. The Netflix Search experience, on the other hand, allows users to take active control of discovering new videos by explicitly expressing their entertainment needs via search queries. In this talk, we discuss the importance of producing search results that go beyond traditional keyword-matches to effectively satisfy users' search needs in the Netflix entertainment setting. Motivated by users' various search intents, we highlight the necessity to improve Search by applying approaches that have historically powered the Homepage. Specifically, we discuss our approach to leverage recommendations in the context of Search and to effectively organize search results to provide a product experience that meaningfully adds value for our users.