Best Practices: Search

There are two types of search: single network, and multinetwork.

Single network search is when you search within one of your networks. Wavelength will return only members of that network. Most searches are single network searches.

Multinetwork search is when you leave a network and navigate to "Search All Groups". From there you can search all of your networks on Wavelength at once. This functionality appears when you have more than one network on Wavelength. At the multinetwork level, admin email and data edit functions are disabled.

Both single network and multinetwork search use the same intuitive search bar.

You search via a single search bar, much like Google. There are no filters or dropdowns. Instead Wavelength understands what you are looking for and returns the relevant results.

You can search for any data in a profile. Wavelength looks through the following fields and assesses if you query matches any of them.

*There are special operators assigned to these fields to improve search.

You can mix and match all fields that do not have special operators. For instance if you want to find all the attorneys in New York, you can mix the city and position fields and search “new york attorney.”

Be careful! Some search terms have synonyms associated with them and some do not. Be sure to check variations of titles and locations to get best results (like attorney vs lawyer).

Wavelength has a few search features that make it easier for you to find the people you want.

Any 2 digit or 4 digit number is assumed to be a class year. So if you type 14 or 2014, all members of the class of 2014 will return.

You can string a number of classes together by separating them by commas. So if you want to find members of the class of 1986 and 2014 because they have a reunion coming up you can search “1986, 2014” and only people in those classes will return.

If you want to search for many adjacent classes at once, you can search them by putting a dash in between the first and last class year. For instance, if you want to search all the members of the classes from the 90s, you can search “90-99”.

Note you cannot combine adjacent class search with single class search (commas), and you can’t search multiple adjacent class queries at one time (eg “2015-2017, 2019-2020” will not work).

Sometimes you may know only part of someone’s name. Unlike normal search in which Wavelength will match fields with the full term, Wavelength search lets you use partial names to find people.

For instance, If you aren’t sure if someone is named Jon or Jonathan, a search for “Jon” will return both (But people named “John” will not). If you know Jon’s last name starts with a “Sm” you can search “Jon Sm” and all the Jon and Jonathan (and other names beginnng with Jon) with “Sm” at the start of their last name will return.

Chapters work like any normal field, but users have the additional option of specifying "chapter: " before a chapter query in order to return results from only that chapter.

For most users, adding the "chapter: " advanced operator is unecessary. Wavelength is smart enough to figure out what you are looking for. This advanced search operator is useful for when an administrator needs to email only members of a chapter, let's say Tufts, and does not want to email everyone affiliated with Tufts,

Once Wavelength has matched your search query with results, its algorithm ranks your results based on relevance and relationship strength.

Wavelength looks at the frequency of each search term to help rank the most relevant profiles. For instance, a profile that has the term “engineer” a couple times will rank higher than a profile that has many titles and the term “engineer” appears once.

It’s important that you keep your profile updated because Wavelength looks at your profile and assesses how well you might know the results and then weights your relationship with them. People that have worked or gone to school at the same place, are members of other networks together, or live in the same city, populate higher than those that do not.

Relationship strength matters because even if you do not know someone, the fact you have more things in common makes it easier to relate over shared experiences.

These guides help your organization take your network to the next level.