Entity based search retrieval and ranking

A system comprising:

• a non-transitory computer-readable medium having instructions stored thereon, which, when executed by a processor, cause the system to perform operations comprising:
• identifying one or more query terms;
• for each of the one or more query terms:
• searching a standardized entity taxonomy to locate a standardized entity that most closely matches the query term, the standardized entity taxonomy comprising an entity identification for each of a plurality of different standardized entities;
• calculating a confidence score for a query term-standardized entity pair comprising the query term and the standardized entity that most closely matches the query term;
• and
• tagging the query term with the entity identification corresponding to the standardized entity that most closely matches the query term based on the calculated confidence score;
• and
• causing a search request having the one or more query terms and the entity identifications tagged to the one or more query terms to be processed.

A non-transitory machine-readable storage medium comprising instructions, which when implemented by one or more machines, cause the one or more machines to perform operations comprising:

• identifying one or more query terms;
• for each of the one or more query terms:
• searching a standardized entity taxonomy to locate a standardized entity that most closely matches the query term, the standardized entity taxonomy comprising an entity identification for each of a plurality of different standardized entities;
• calculating a confidence score for a query term-standardized entity pair comprising the query term and the standardized entity that most closely matches the query term;
• and
• tagging the query term with the entity identification corresponding to the standardized entity that most closely matches the query term based on the calculated confidence score;
• and
• causing a search request having the one or more query terms and the entity identifications tagged to the one or more query terms to be processed.