Maximizing Your Google Search Results

Google is an amazing tool to have in your arsenal. Over the course of the next few months, I will be talking about several of these tools. The first that I want to cover is maximizing your search results in Google.

Everyone knows that Google is the King of search engines. But it seems that only the tech savvy can make the most of what Google search has to offer. Today I will show you just how easy it can be to maximize your Google search results.

1. Capitalization.

Google searches are not case sensitive. Rest assured, whether you use lower case or a mixture of capital and lowercase letters, your search results will always be the same.

2. Actual Search.

When searching Google, your results will be better tailored to what you are searching for if you use phrases instead of single words. For example, if you are looking for a PR Firm, you will get better and more relevant results when you provide specific parameters. If I type PR Firm into Google, I receive 10,600,000 results. This is a lot of websites to weed through, so I need to change my search parameters. If I make a simple change to PR Firm Houston, TX immediately my search results drop to 299,000. If I break that down even further to PR Firm Houston, TX Pharmaceutical, my results are even less at 176,000.

The more specific you define your search parameters, the more specific results you will receive.

3. Exact Phrase Searches.

If you put quotes around your search phrase in the Google search box, the only results that you will see are web pages containing that exact phrase. For example, if I type “the way we think, speak and act” into Google search, I get 620 results. Of those 620 results, I will find my exact search phrase on each site.

4. Cache.

The cache feature is helpful if you want to see the cached version of your web page or that of another company on Google. In the Google search box type “cache:www.mywebsite.com” (without quotes). You can now see the last time Google “crawled” the site and what your web page looks like stored on Google.

5. Link.

Have you ever wondered how many sites are linking to yours? The link feature in Google search will tell you just that. Go to Google search and type in “link:www.mywebsite.com” (without quotes) and it will tell you how many websites link to your home page. You can use this feature for any page on your website.

Each of the Google search features I mentioned above can be easily added to your everyday searching on Google. Google offers a great resource that you can save on your desktop or print for easy reference called “Better Searches. Better Results”. It’s free to download here.

Did I miss any of your favorite Google search tips? If so, I would love to hear from you.