Google Search Secrets (aka How To Stop Wasting Your Time Looking for Stuff)
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We all know that the Google search engine is a powerhouse, serving up hundreds of thousands of pages based on your keywords. Most of us click the top-ranking links and explore the first page or two at the most. If we don’t find what we need, we go back to the search bar and try a different search phrase. Wondering if there’s a better way? There is! You can easily fine-tune your Google searches – and you do not have to remember the ins and outs of Boolean logic. The secret: Advanced Search.
The link to Advanced Search is to the right of the search bar. Simply click this link and enter your search parameters. The Advanced Search screen allows for specifying results based on: all words, exact words, additional words, unwanted words, file type, Web site or domain type, age of page, keyword location, usage rights, region, numeric range, and similarity to a specified page.
For example, if you are researching a topic and want to limit your search to non-commercial Web sites, use Google Advanced Search to limit your search results to pages ending in .org or .gov. The results page will list Web pages from non-profit and government Web sites. Researching William Shakespeare? A standard search turns up 148 million results while restricting results to pages ending in .edu turns up just 143,000 results – all from academic institutions.
Now suppose that you want to find recent information for your topic, not twenty-year-old studies or obsolete information. Use the Google Advanced Search’s Date field to restrict results to recent pages such as the past 24 hours, past week, past month, or past year.
Looking for a specific file type such as PDF or PowerPoint presentations? Use the File Type field to specify the type of format you want Google to find. Too many forum posts or blog entries related to your search? Use the Unwanted Words field to restrict results containing words such as “forum,” “forums,” and “blogs.” For example, a standard Google search for the words “blue screen errors” turned up over 44 million results. Restricting forum and blog results cut this number in half. Selecting the PDF file format whittles the results down to under 300,000.
In addition to the numerous restrictions that you can make in this screen, Google’s Advanced Search also lists several topic-specific search engines including: Google Book Search, Google Code Search, Google Scholar, Google News Archive Search, Microsoft, Apple-Macintosh, Linux, BSD Unix, U.S. Government, and Universities. Many of these specialized Google search engines have Advanced Search options of their own, allowing you to further fine-tune your search criteria.
If you haven’t been using the Advanced Search feature of Google, you’re probably wasting a lot of time landing on irrelevant Web pages. Take a few moments upfront to enter your search criteria and immediately land on pages that have the information that you are searching for.
Other Google search tips include the use of operators, specific strings, etc. Here are some resources I found that offer insight into how you can fine-tune your search results:
Lifehacker – Top 10 Obscure Google Search Tricks
10 Most Amazing Google Search Tricks
15 Awesome Google Search Tips and Tricks
Andrea KalliCertified Internet and Social Marketing VA
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September 11th, 2009 at 9:34 pm
[...] Google Search Secrets (aka How To Stop Wasting Your Time Looking for Stuff) We all know that the Google search engine is a powerhouse, serving up hundreds of thousands of pages based on your keywords. Most of us click the top-ranking links and explore the first page or two at the most. If we don’t find what we need, we go back to…… [...]