Methods and systems for generating query and result-based relevance indexes

A computer-implemented method comprising:

• receiving, at a search engine, a plurality of signals, wherein each signal includes a query from a user;
• associating, at the search engine, each query with a topical query category;
• providing to a user, at the search engine, a plurality of results for each query category to the user in response to a query;
• measuring, at the search engine, user interaction with the plurality of results based on one or more metrics, to determine measured data for each result;
• associating, at the search engine, the measured data with the metric used to measure it;
• storing the measured data of each result and the metric associated with it on a medium;
• providing, at the search engine, a client with a tool to select a result of the plurality of results;
• receiving from the client, at the search engine, a selection of a result;
• providing, at the search engine, the client with a tool to select metric data associated with the selected result;
• receiving from the client, at the search engine, a request for metric data request associated with the selected result;
• transmitting, by the search engine, the stored measured data of the selected result to the client in response to the metric data request;
• and
• compiling the requested metric data for the selected category into a 2-dimensional graph.

A computer system comprising:

• at least one processor;
• at least one medium connected to the processor;
• and
• a data set on the medium, the data set being at least readable by the processor and including:
• measured data of a query and metric data;
• a search engine, wherein the search engine is enabled to receive a plurality of signals, each signal including a query from a user, provide a client with a tool to select a topical query category from a plurality of topical query categories, receive from the client a selection of a topical category, provide the client with a tool to select data associated with a metric, receive a metric data request from the client, and transmit the stored measured data associated with the selected metric to the client in response to the metric data request;
• and
• a module to measure each query using one or more metrics to determine measured data for each query and associate each query into a topical query category using the stored measured data;
• and
• compiling the requested metric data for the selected category into a 2-dimensional graph.