One of the most compelling features in SharePoint 2010 is Managed Metadata Service, or MMS for short. Simply put, metadata is data that describes other data. A good way to conceptualize metadata might be to think of a photograph that you’ve taken in the past. The photo is the actual data, and metadata that describes it might include the size of the file, where the photograph was taken and who is in it. In this post, I’m going to focus on how MMS can help you manage metadata, and how, if leveraged properly, it can significantly improve the quality of Enterprise Search in your organization.

Why do I need metadata? Why can’t I just search like I do on Google?

This is the question that comes up most often when I’m at trade shows, conferences, what have you. From a user’s perspective, all they do on Google is enter two or three keywords, and voila – relevant results! What they are not seeing happens behind the scenes, before their query is ever run. The two or three word query is boosted by metadata.