Search engines are essentially massive databases that are automatically compiled using a mechanism called crawlers or spiders. Specialized software helps you find information within these databases. It’s important to understand that when you search for information, you’re not actually searching the entire web; rather, you’re searching a specific part of the web retrieved from previously indexed databases. Therefore, if you want to get the information you need accurately, your search method must be efficient to help the crawlers return to the databases and retrieve the correct results. So, how do you get the best search results on Google?
Google is the world’s leading search engine. Despite the existence of other search engines, some of which have disappeared, and others that still exist, Google has surpassed them all, capturing approximately 90% of global searches. This article will provide you with a set of tips and steps for searching on Google that will help you obtain more accurate results.
1- Search within websites:
This is an easy method that yields relatively reliable results. If you want to learn how to use an application, you can search on any tech website’s search engine.
2- Use the asterisk (*):
You might be looking for a poem, song, or quote, but you can’t remember the exact phrase. In this case, you can write the phrase you remember and place an asterisk (*) next to it.
Example: If you’re looking for Al-Mutanabbi’s poem that includes the line “Ours is the highest honor, not the grave,” you can get the correct result by writing: “Ours is the highest honor, not the grave.”
3- Use tags or hashtags:
This involves placing the hash symbol (#) before the desired word, such as #apps, and using the underscore (_) to connect words in compound phrases, such as #AndroidApps. This method will show you results on social media platforms like Twitter and Instagram, even if you don’t have an account on either network.
4- Specify the type of information:
This is an easy and intuitive search method, but many people sometimes overlook it. Here, we mean searching for information according to its type. For example, if you want to find textual information on any website in the world, search in “All.” If you don’t find results related to what you’re looking for, you can search in “Images” and then follow the image source, which is often accompanied by a description. This is certainly not all; there are many basic filtering methods in Google, which you can find in the top bar directly after the search box. For example, searching in “Books” is useful if you’re looking for academic references. This feature allows you to find specific texts from books that may not be available for free or are too recent to access. In addition, there are categories that allow you to search for other types of content, such as videos, news, maps, shopping, flights, finance, and more.
5- Searching by Language, Time, and Expression Precision: This refers to using the second bar located below the previous one. It contains three filters that help you refine your search, such as the language filter, which allows you to search for information in your chosen language. The time filter allows you to narrow down results to a specific time period, such as the most recent posts, results from the last 24 hours, the last month, or the last year, and so on. The third filter determines whether to display all results or limit them to their literal meaning. These three filters are among the best and fastest methods used to refine search results today.
6- Use quotation marks:
This is used to restrict search results to the exact phrase written, without changing the word order. For example, if you search for an app to find a restaurant, you will likely get other results related to restaurant information that may not be helpful. In this case, it is better to write this phrase between double quotation marks, like this: “app to find a restaurant.”
7- Use the plus and minus signs (+ and -): This method is used to exclude a specific word from the search because the engine might interpret it as something more popular than what you are looking for. For example, you might search for the Opera browser and get results about the media personality Oprah Winfrey due to her widespread fame. To exclude related search results, you can type your search term like this: +Oprah-Winfrey, provided there are no spaces between each tag and the adjacent word, as shown.
8- Use Advanced Search:
Despite Google’s advantages, simply typing your search term and searching the results on the first page may not guarantee you’ll find exactly what you’re looking for, especially if you need it for a scientific research paper that requires highly accurate and reliable results. In this case, using Google’s Advanced Search is recommended. Once you use this method, you’ll find it indispensable due to its high degree of search flexibility. As shown in the image, it offers many of the previously mentioned search methods with more precise and comprehensive features, such as:
Specifying a group of words or an entire phrase.
Excluding part of a sentence or phrase.
Specifying a specific word within a sentence.
What distinguishes Advanced Search from the previous methods is the ability to narrow down results to a range of two numbers. This is useful if you’re looking for precise figures and statistics.
You can also specify the website you want to search by name or domain name.
Specify where you want the results to appear on the page: in the title, the text, or the links.
Specify the file type you are searching for. This is especially useful if you are writing academic research, as it helps you find studies and research in specific formats such as DOS and PDF.
Customize the SafeSearch feature to filter out adult content.
Search within results related to a specific geographic region.