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Whether you’re a student, or working professional, Google is the most essential tool for learning or finding any important information. Here are most simple Google search tips and tricks that most didn’t know about it.
How to search the Internet effectively?
Till now we are searching simply by writing keyword or whatever coming into our mind. The disadvantages of such search results are that it won’t be as specific as actually needed or it may come out with totally different search result. This may lead to wastage of time and effort.
All Google search tips and tricks that are highlighted below are not at all geeky. So, don’t be afraid of and no need to remember by heart. Many of these tips you may have tried before or totally unknown to you. These search tips would be helpful to every type of searcher whether they are a student or professional.
So, how to search Google like a pro?
5 Google Search Tips and Tricks Everyone Should Know
How to Search Google to Exclude Words?
Query: I want to search for “Antivirus” in Google but it should not include word “software” and also it should not include site wikipedia.org
Solution: Simply add a dash (-) before a word or site name to exclude all results that include that word. It specially used to narrow the result with multiple meaning. So, if you want to exclude software word from all antivirus search results, then search query would be
Antivirus -software
Antivirus -site:wikipedia.org
Antivirus -site:wikipedia.org -software
How to Search Google for an Exact Phrase or Words?
Query: I want to search on Google the exact words in that exact order without any change. Like I want to search “New York Times”.
Solution: Simply use quotes to search query for an exact word in a same order. But, by insisting on phrase search you might be excluding good results accidentally.
“New York Times”
“Antivirus software”
How to Search Within a Website Using Google?
Query: I want to perform a search within a website or domain. Like I want to search Olympic within site www.bbc.co.uk or www.usatoday.com or all site with .gov domain.
Solution: You can get result simply by adding keyword followed by site:domainname.com or site:.gov. Google make sure that your search results must come from a given website.
olympics site:bbc.co.uk [include result only from bbc.co.uk]
olympics site:usatoday.com [include result only from usatoday.com]
olympics site:.gov [include result only from .gov domain]
How to Search for Pages That Link to a URL?
Query: I want to know the number of pages or link pointing to my site url
Solution: Simply type Link:URL shows pages point to the URL.
Link:www.google.comLink:www.usatoday.com
Link:www.usatoday.com -site:usatoday.com
How to Search for Similar Pages in Google?
Solution: You can get a similar site by adding related followed by url name. It means you can get a similar news publication site you are interested in.
related:cbsnews.com
related:foxnews.com
It’s Your Turn
So, finally you learned simple Google search tips and tricks. Isn’t easy? Share your experience and insights in a comment box below