Now that we’ve looked at a Intro to Search and have a basic idea of how a search engine works, now we need to look at what we can do to improve our own search results – i.e. those things that get returned when you type what you want into the search engine.
Knowing that everything you type into a search engine goes through the index helps. But did you know that Google estimates that one out of four search entries is for something it has never seen before!?
Yet it still provides results, and knowing how to give a better question is going to mean you are going to get a better answer.
For example, if I search for “Apple”, and I looking for the tech company, the record label, or the fruit? Search engines have to make guesses. But the more you give it the less it has to guess.
Your Search Phrase
The first thing you can do is add words to your search. In the old days, three words was considered a lot. Now a days, that average has grown, unless you are on a phone.
Yet the more words you provide, the more “clues” you give to the search engine to help find what you are looking for.
If you take your “Apple” search before, and then search for “Apple Phone Support” you’ve provided a lot more information. The search engine can eliminate tens of thousands of recipe sites, as well as sites dealing with the Beatles (who released under Apple Records), and even a lot of information about the tech company.
Add a few more words, like “Apple Phone Support for Broken Screen and Can’t unlock” and now you are fine tuning your results in like a laser. You won’t get as many results back, but the ones you do, are going to be about solving your problem.
Removing Elements
Of course, even when you add additional words, you can still be ambiguous. For example, are you looking for phone support, like something you can call up – but can’t because you can’t unlock your phone, or support about your iPhone – and you simply forgot to add the i in front of phone?
So some of your results might deal with tablets, laptops, etc. Therefore you can put a minus sign in front of new words like -iPad, and -laptop to remove those words from the results. This will further narrow your results, assuming you are looking for results about fixing your iPhone. Conversely, you might put -iPhone if you are looking on where to call about your iPad which has a broken screen and you really want to talk to someone instead of using a web form.
Requiring Certain Words
Search engines look at all the terms you enter and try to determine which ones are more important (the ones you type first by the way) and which words are found in the index.
It may find that your second and third words are in the index, but your fourth isn’t. Or maybe they aren’t next to each other.
In some search engines you can put quotes (“) around phrases that need to appear together, and a plus (+) in front of a word or phrase that must appear in the search. However, Google uses the quote to show phrases as well as required. It’s a little confusing, but you get used to it. It has to do with their old failed social media platform – Google Plus… but that’s a long story for a different day.
Special Words
Certain words will clue in a search engine about what you want. Asking for something “near me” will allow results which are for places close to you to appear.
Adding words like “on sale”, “buy”, or “in stock” will put items for sale in the results.
There are lots of special words that will slightly alter your results, and they are constantly changing.
Special Types of Results
Under the types of results you can search for, you also find results based upon a type of information. Some of these will almost always appear while others may only appear some times.
Notice across the top, you can search by “all”, which is everything, “news” which means only results by verified news agencies, “Shopping” which is only products for sale, “Images” which is common and of course only displays images, “Maps”, and “More” – a drop down list.
Which of these appear and in what order will vary based upon your search criteria.
Notice with adding two simple words, Maps disappears, Video is added, and images is closer to the front. Search engines will attempt to figure out what is best, and then display that for you.
Improving Your Search was originally found on Access 2 Learn
