What do we do when we need to search for anything on the internet? We google it. Right?
These days we often use the term “google” as a verb rather than as a noun. This popularity of Google is evident from the fact that “Google” is the most used search engine on the web and handles more than 3 billion searches each day. Almost all computer users use google in their daily life. The question we are going to address today is whether you are using google in the right way. Or do you just put some random words in the search query and keep changing the query terms till you get the desired results? Well, you can get the results you want in the first search query itself. Most of the users are unaware of the tags which are necessary parts of a good search query.
Below are some of them using which you can maximize your chances of getting the most relevant results in Google search.
1. Exclude Keyword
To exclude a specific keyword just add a minus sign (-) before the keyword. For example, the search query “great laptops” has resulted from many companies including Lenovo.
Suppose you don’t want to see Lenovo laptops in your results, then the search query would be “great laptops –Lenovo”
2. Search Exact Phrase
To search for an exact phrase just enclose the phrase within double quotes. Google will search for the words in the double quotes in the order you type them in.
3. Site-Specific Search
To search on a specific website just add the keyword “site:” followed by the site name. It is worthwhile to note that most of the time, google search using a site tag is better than using build-in search features of websites. For instance, if you need to search questions on algorithms, you write the following query.
But you know that you can get the best questions on algorithms on www.geeksforgeeks.org, so just modify the query as below and you get all results from neveropen.
4. Search for Word Definitions
To search for the definition/meaning of any word quickly, just add the term “define:” before the word in the google search query.
5. Search Files of a Specific Type
To search files of a specific filetype, for instance, pdf, add the keyword “filetype:” followed by the filetype along with the normal search keywords
6. Similar Webpages
To find webpages similar to a specific webpage, add the keyword “related:” followed by the website URL. This is a very powerful and useful tag. There isn’t any other straightforward way to find websites similar to a given site.
7. Search Results Precisely by Time
Google provides a lot of filters, one of which is time. You can search for any specific time frame, say the last 24 hours. This comes in handy when you need to look for news about a specific issue in a specific time frame.
