Patent ID: 8046371

Claim:
A method performed by one or more server devices, comprising: receiving, by a processor associated with the one or more server devices, a search query; identifying, using a processor associated with the one or more server devices, a geographical area and a location within the geographical area; identifying, using a processor associated with the one or more server devices, a first document that is associated with a first geographic location and that is related to the search query, where the first geographic location is located within the geographical area; identifying, using a processor associated with the one or more server devices, a second document that is associated with a second geographic location and that is related to the search query, where the second geographic location is located outside of the geographical area; assigning, using a processor associated with the one or more server devices, a first score to the first document using a location prominence factor, where the location prominence factor does not include a measure of distance or a measure of relevancy of the first document to the search query; assigning, using a processor associated with the one or more server devices, a second score to the second document using a measure of distance between the second geographic location and the location within the geographical area, and not using the location prominence factor; and presenting, by a processor associated with the one or more server devices, information associated with the first and second documents based on the first and second scores, respectively.