How to search efficiently with Google

We all use it every day and every time we have some problems  it seems to hold all the answers. How many times did you said: “go do a Google Search”. Despite of being used so often many people don’t know some simple basic things on how to search efficiently for what they want.

Here are some quick basic tips on how to search:

1. Type your search term and hit Search (obvious but I had to mention the ultimate basic). If you want your search results to match the search term exactly use double quotes. Example “search term”

2. Let’s say you search for word1 and in results you see another word2 that keeps showing. You can exclude the search results containing the second word (word2) by searching like this: word1 -word2. The “-” sign ensures the exclusion of the search term that follows

3. Sometimes Google search results highlights synonyms. If you want to search only for your term use the “+” sign. Example +word1

4. If you want to search a keyword in a certain website:  site:www.domain.com word1 word2

5. You can search in a specific directory of a website:   site:www.domain.com/directory/ word1 word3

6. If you want to search for pages within a website that have a specific term in titles:  site:www.domain.com intitle:word1

7. If you want to search if a specific anchor text exists in a website:   site:www.domain.com inanchor:word1

8. If you want to search if a specific word is located in URLs of a website:   site:www.domain.com inurl:word1

9. You can also search top level domains:  site:com word1  OR  site:gov word1

Here are my suggestions. What’s yours? Share your knowledge in comments bellow.