Methods and Systems for Prioritizing Entities in Search Results

Exemplary embodiments relate to techniques for providing search results, such as when performing a type-ahead search. If an exact match to the search query is available, the exact match is used. If no exact match exists, search results are prioritized based primarily on responsiveness and pixel data, and secondarily based on metrics including locale/location, fancount, and social signal information. If a user searches for an entity having multiple results, the system will attempt to find a local result that is proximate to the user, but will prioritize a search hit for a more responsive result over other results. This boosts the chance that the user will get a response if they leave a message for the searched entity. Entities may be omitted from search results if they are unable to send or receive messages.