User needs [Broder '02, Rose et al '04, Jansen et al '08]

Informational - want to learn about something (39% / 61% / 81%)

Navigational - want to go to that page (25% / 15% / 10%)

Transactional - want to do something (web-mediated) (36% / 24% / 9%)

Access a service

Downloads

Shop

Gray areas

Find a good hub

Exploratory search see what's there

Broder, A. 2002. A taxonomy of web search. SIGIR Forum 36(2):3-10.
Rose, D.E. and Levinson, D. 2004. Understanding user goals in web search.
    Proc 13th Int Conf on World Wide Web, New York, 13-19.
Jansen, B.J., Booth, D.L. and Spink, A. 2008. Determining the informational, navigational, and transactional intent of Web queries.
    Information Processing and Management, 44:1251-1266.