When performing a search, you don’t always get the results you need. If you are looking for something specific, you have to know how to find it. Let’s say you are searching “Search engine optimization.” If you type the query (request for information) into Google basic search, of course the first things you will see are Ads related to search engine optimization, SEO. If you scroll down a bit, the first result you will see is a Wikipedia page. You will almost always see Wikipedia show up on your Google results, because Google finds Wikipedia easy to load.
Your results should have the words “search” and “engine” and “optimization” in it. On the other hand, if you wanted to perform a search on either “search” or “engine,” you would type into Google “Search OR engine.” And Google would know to bring up results with only one of the two words in it. The “OR” in your search is called an operator. Operators help to tell Google exactly what it is that you are looking for. There are so many different operators you can use. Google provides a helpful quick guide of operators for its users here: http://www.googleguide.com/advanced_operators.html.
Another way to help you search for exactly what you’re looking for is through Google Advanced Search, at http://www.google.com/advanced_search. Through advanced search you can specify whether you’re looking for a phrase or certain words, what you are not looking for, or even by usage rights! If I want an image on SEO to post on my blog, I can type SEO in as the query and “narrow results by usage rights” so it is free to use and share.
If you want to stay in touch with current news about search engine optimization (or a different topic) you can sign up for Google Alerts! A few days ago, I signed up for Google Alerts on “Search engine optimization.” Since then, Google has sent me three emails containing new news, blogs, and websites having to do with SEO. For example, a new article about SEO was posted, so Google sent me the link http://www.dailycamera.com/business/submit/15-sec-pitch-business/ci_21711567/15-second-pitch-boulder-seo-marketing so that I could check it out!
Lastly, Google offers a search to find scholarly articles on http://scholar.google.com. If you search for SEO on Google Scholar, you will find results that are typically HTML or PDF files. The first one that shows up is actually a book! http://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=EbhSiSvzQLEC&oi=fnd&pg=PA2&dq=search+engine+optimization&ots=a_OMKFPlU_&sig=rIUvvnXVru5Uy8vLIB9GRsPXO6c#v=onepage&q=search%20engine%20optimization&f=false. What a great tool Google provides!
