‘Yext Answers’ Launched to Help Brands Take Back Their Truth; Brings AI-Based Search to Business Websites

By Sudipto Ghosh On Oct 29, 2019

'Yext Answers' Launched to Help Brands Take Back Their Truth; Brings AI-Based Search to Business Websites

Leading Search Experience Cloud company, Yext, today launched Yext Answers. Yext Answers is a revolutionary new search product that turns any brand’s website into a powerful search engine capable of answering consumers’ questions directly with brand verified answers. This launch is the latest step furthering Yext’s mission to deliver “perfect answers everywhere”.

The customer journey starts with a question, and every day consumers search for answers about brands. However, they are increasingly served false or misleading information from sources other than the brand. Yext, with its Search Intelligence solutions, help brands regain and maintain a direct relationship with their customers.

“We’re living in a new age of search, and consumers are asking more specific questions than ever. But, brands haven’t had the ability to answer those questions, opening the door for unverified third-party sites to step in with misinformation,” said Howard Lerman, Founder and CEO of Yext.

Howard added, “Yext Answers is going to change that forever by putting brand verified answers front and center on business websites.”

In fact, marketers believe that only 35% of the information about their brands online is accurate. But, consumers lean heavily on the information they get from search to make their purchase decisions. About 42% of consumers new to a brand trust search engine results over the brand’s website.2 If a brand doesn’t directly provide fact-based answers to questions about their businesses on their own domain, their customers will turn to a search engine – which means the brand loses control of the customer journey. It’s never been more imperative for brands to take back control of their truth online, starting with their own website.

Answers enables brands to deliver a rich, contextual search experience on their own website that rivals the experiences of the most sophisticated search engines. Powering Answers is the Yext Knowledge Graph, which harnesses and stores millions of structured facts from brands and can be updated in real-time. If a brand starts to see their customers asking new or different types of questions, they can update their knowledge graph to provide a fact-based, contextual brand verified answer in seconds – keeping customers engaged on their own website.

“Answers employs advanced natural language processing to understand complex questions that consumers enter into the search bar on a business’s website, apply the appropriate filters, and deliver dynamic, direct answers.” said Marc Ferrentino, Chief Strategy Officer of Yext. “In short, Yext makes brands the ultimate source of truth about themselves online.”

Answers increases Yext’s total addressable market (TAM) from only businesses with physical locations and entities to any business with a website. Brands across industries transformed their websites with Answers during its beta period, including BBVA USA, Three Mobile, IHA, and Healthcare Associates of Texas.

“We’ve built an incredible business by giving brands control of their facts in search, but we’ve only scratched the surface of our potential,” Lerman added, “With Answers, we’re ready to help every business with a website take back their truth online.”

With a mission to provide perfect answers everywhere, Yext puts businesses in control of their facts online by delivering brand verified answers straight from the source — wherever their customers are searching. Companies like Taco Bell, Marriott, Jaguar-Land Rover, and businesses around the world use Yext to take back control of the customer journey, starting on their own website.

Yext has been named a Best Place to Work by Fortune and Great Place to Work®, as well as a Best Workplace for Women. Yext is headquartered in New York City with offices in Amsterdam, Berlin, Chicago, Dallas, Geneva, London, Miami, Milan, Paris, San Francisco, Shanghai, Tokyo, and the Washington, D.C. area.