Asked about Fixing the query, not just the ranking

Your RAG chatbot answers the first question well and follow-ups badly. Why, and what do you do?

An answer that works

Follow-ups depend on earlier turns, so embedding the raw message retrieves the wrong things. Rewrite each turn into a standalone question using the history before retrieving, and measure the change on a set of real follow-up questions.

Then they push further

The rewrite adds 300ms. Is it worth it?

Measure it. If recall on follow-ups rises substantially, usually yes, and a small fast model keeps the delay down. Skip the rewrite when the message is already self-contained, which a cheap check can detect.

What gets marked up

Marked up for spotting that the query lacks context and for measuring the fix rather than stacking techniques.

Reading an answer is not being able to give one. The section that teaches this is Fixing the query, not just the ranking, 4 hours of Reranking & hybrid search.

Learn this properly