Searching with Google

When using the Google search engine, you must be specific in what you ask and HOW you ask it
to get the results you desire.

How to be specific with Google

Let's say you are interested in finding out more about the field of basket weaving. To search for
that exact phrase you put "quotes" around the phrase like this: "basket weaving". This forces
Google to cough up search results with those exact words in that specific order, only. If you
didn't use quotes and just typed in basket weaving, you would get results that included the words:
basket and weaving mixed in with the MORE SPECIFIC results of the precise phrase "basket
weaving".
(BTW.......for those of you who are used to searching by putting the word "and" between all your
search words, with Google, it's not necessary. Google automatically "thinks" like that by
default.)
You can use the "or" feature on Google. For example: "basket weaving" or "basketweaving" and
you will get combined results for both exact phrases. The word "or" can be replaced with the
"pipe" ( | ) symbol (the symbol above the "\" forward slash on your keyboard) to achieve the
same results.

“_” + - ..

Now, let's say you want to search for articles written about the subject of Basket Weaving. You
can use the Google "require" feature and have a specific word included in the search just by
adding a "+" sign in front of the keyword you want included.. For example you would type:
"basket weaving" +articles and the results would give you articles about basket weaving. You
can also exclude a certain word from your searches by using the "-" (minus sign) like: "basket
weaving" -supplies, which would give results about basket weaving excluding "supplies".
Whenever you can, try to combine these three symbols (quotes, plus and minus signs) into a
single search to give you even more targeted results.

You can also search a date span by using the “ .. “ command. If I want to search basket weaving
from 1800 to 1950, I can search for “basket weaving” 1800..1950

Title Search:

Google has some advanced search options, which come in quite handy; depending on what items
you may be searching. TITLE SEARCH: Allows you to search for pages and sites that have
specific words or phrases in their title. For example: intitle: "basket weaving"
This search would only give you results of sites that have that particular phrase in their title.
Site Search: 

Gives you the opportunity to search pages ONLY within a specific site or domain (or using the
"negative" results technique from above you can "exclude" results from a specific domain or site
as well). For example: "basket weaving" site:nationalgeographic.com This search would only
provide results for the phrase "basket weaving" from the site nationalgeographic.com

URL Searches: 

Allows you to search for pages or sites that have a specific word or phrase in their URL. For
example: inurl: "basket weaving" This search would only give you a list of sites that have the
exact phrase "basket weaving" in their URL. To do a real power search, try combining a couple
of the above techniques into one search like: intitle: "basket weaving" -site: ebay.com This
search would give you results for your selected phrase, found in a title, but not on ebay.com
Neat, huh?

Related Searches:

 Let's say you want to search for sites (competitors ? ) to a specific site. Once again we'll use our
own site as an example: related: nationalgeographic.com This search will show sites that have
related content and subject matter to the site which you typed into after "related:"

Google Limits:

Google does have some limits and one of those is the actually number of keywords you can
search on at the same time. That limit is (10). Type in anymore than (10) keywords and the
subsequent words will not be included in your search and thus, are irrelevant.
Common words are ignored by Google such as: "a, about, an, and, are, as at, be, by, from, how,
I, in, is, it, of, on, or, that, the, this, to, we, what, when, where, which, with". You can override
this limitation by putting a plus sign ( + ) in front of any of the above words when using them in
a search phrase.

Wildcards:

A wildcard search uses the asterisk sign ( * ) (the one above the #8 on your keyboard) to
represent other non-specific characters or words. For example: "* language" would turn up
results for: sign language, foreign language, English language, programming language, etc.

Types of Files:

 You can limit your Google search results to specific files ending in a particular extension
(.doc, .txt, .rtf, .pdf etc...)
To find a file on the topic "basket weaving" in Adobe (.pdf) format you would type in: "basket
weaving" filetype:pdf
You can exclude certain types of files from your search by doing a "negative" search and placing
a "minus" ( - ) sign in front of the "filetype:"
File types:

.avi = Audio/Video Interleave file .pdf = Adobe PDF document

.bmp = Bitmap Image file .pps = PowerPoint Show
.csv = comma separated values file .ppt = PowerPoint
.doc = Word document .rtf = rich text format document
.flv = Flash Video file .txt = text document
.gif = Graphical Interchange Format image file .wav = WAVE audio file
.jpg = JPEG Image file .wma = Windows Media audio file
.mid = MIDI audio file .wmv = Windows Media video file
.mov = Apple QuickTime movie file .xls = Excel document
.mp3 = MP3 audio file .zip = compressed file package

Plain Text Searches: 

By using Google's "intext" search capabilities, you can search JUST the body text of web pages
and not any links, urls or titles, just the body. Simply type: intext:"direct response marketing"

Google “helpers”

Related Searches

At the bottom of the search page, Google offers related searches. These are suggestions for other
keyword variations to assist you in your search.

Wonder Wheel

Hidden under the Show Options link, you will find the Wonder Wheel.
The Wonder Wheel creates a visual map of related searches while also listing the search results
on the right-hand side of the page. The Wonder Wheel search options are clickable and can lead
to a more refined search of your topic.

Timeline

In addition to the Wonder Wheel, you can examine information trends using the Timeline. The
time bands are clickable and will allow you to refine your search based on bands of time.