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Know what to Google and what not to
Sometimes, Google may not be the best search engine for what you are searching for. If you are looking for a better search engine option, there may be one that is available but not well known e.g. the cruft-free Blekko. Google will always have an answer for you but if you are not satisfied with it, you can check out the various other options that are available
Make use of the search tools on your browser
By clicking the search tools on your browser, you will be able to clearly short list what you are looking for. You will be able to give exact details of what you are looking for in the internet. By clicking the search tools, the following 3 three things will appear on your page. They are;
a. Any time
b. All results
c. The city and state of what you are searching for.
The marketers can use this additional search options to narrow down their search to the specific areas and time. Example; if a marketer is looking for specific marketing information the happened in Atlanta Georgia, he or she will type the heading of what he/she is looking for and then add the state. This prevents Google from wasting time to search the entire content but to narrow the research to Atlanta Georgia only.
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Using advanced operators such as Boolean Search
This is an additional search options that has been used for decades by various researchers and marketers. People with the intention of searching for mathematical and statistical information will benefit from these tools as it incorporates some math logics. If you know the exact operators you are searching for, you can by pass all advance search options. You can write operators directly to the search box.
Add custom searches by adjusting the setting for your search tools
Google has granted us the power to customize our search settings. On the search page, you can click on the options menu that links with the search settings. This will take the researcher to a page that allows him/her to adjust the settings. You can adjust the setting for the following
1.Filter explicit results
2.Instant predictions
3.Search history
4.Where results open- sometimes the browser takes a lot of time opening new pages on one window. This setting option allows you to customize you search options to either open new site on different tabs or new browser windows thus saving you time.
5.Personal results – Google sometimes offers you personalized results that are not helpful in your search. You can adjust this setting to ‘do not use personalized results’ to avoid search irrelevant information been offered.
Endlessly scroll through the results
If you have to dig up your search, clicking “next” on each page may be a huge hassle and time consuming. By using autopagerize, you can scroll up and down and move to different pages without the need to click on the “next” button each time.
Improve the Google Cache
In many cases, the may click on the search button and find out that it is taking longer to load and give the results. This might have been caused by temporary breakage of the site or complete breakage. However, you can still have access to the page using Google Cache. You just need to click on the instant preview button for the page and click on “cache” to see it. You can still try to follow the links on the page but this will be time consuming. In order to save time, install Google Cache comeback and you will never run through the error 404 while carrying out your research.
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Ditch the Spammy Results
Nothing is worse than finding great results only to discover that it is just a content farm which is spewing out terms and links built to appear in search results. Luckily, Google has come up with a permanent solution to these cases. They can now protect you from search incidences which lead to waste of time and resources while searching. If you are taken to a site that is not helpful, click on the back button. A block link under the Google results will appear. Click on the “block” link to stop the page from appearing during searches. However, if the “block” link does not appear, you can add it to your personal block list.
Turnoff some off Google’s irritating features
If you do not like some of the features offered by Google e.g. the prediction feature, you can turn them off. Some of the features may be difficult to turn off since you may be required to use user scripts or an AdBlock feature. However, be assured that there is always a way to turn them off.
Make you results easily scannable
It is difficult to scan through boring long texts and links when searching. Luckily, Google has provided some user scripts to make it easier for you. Faviconize Google adds icons to each result so that you can be able to see what web the site originates from. This really comes in handy especially if you have the exact site where you want to carry out the search. You can specify the sites you want to use using these Ads.
These are just some of the essential tips on how marketers & others professionals can save time by searching smartly on Google.
In summary, Google is probably the best search engine we have today; however, you should be keen to know what you are looking for in order to avoid wasting time going through all the irrelevant information that you may come across.
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Jason Smith is an online manager for Hermance who are well known for Mortise and Tenon machine. Jason likes blogging about online strategies that are related to SEO, Content, PPC & Lead generation.