Understanding Requirements of Place in Local Search

We present an online survey (N=306) focused on understanding what factors of location are important when choosing a target place of interest in a local search scenario. Using descriptions of location requirements from a restaurant search as our use case, we provide a characterization of the factors of location that influence decision-making in local search tasks. We highlight the complexity of end-users' location constraints, especially for shared local search scenarios, i.e. scenarios involving others. Even in a relatively mundane scenario, we demonstrate significant gaps in the handling of place requirements in existing location-based services as compared to identified user requirements. Our results point to a number of implications for improving location-based search.