Glossary · Answer engines and retrieval

Hybrid search

Running lexical search (BM25 or similar) and dense vector search together at the retrieval step, then merging the results. It exists because pure semantic search misses exact strings — part numbers, model names, a company name that looks like an ordinary word.

Terms this definition uses

BM25 · Dense vector · retrieval · Semantic search

Answer engines and retrieval

How a generated answer gets made, and what your page is competing for inside it.

AEO · GEO · AI visibility score · share of voice · prompt set · brand mention · RAG · grounding · training data · embedding · chunking · context window · token · hallucination · refusal · AI Overview · answer engine · citation · retrieval · hallucinated attribution · Re-ranking · Passage ranking · Query fan-out · Chunk boundary · BM25 · cross-encoder · AI Mode · information gain · dense retrieval

← hallucinated attribution  ·  Re-ranking →

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