Basic Google Directions
Google is the dominant search engine on the Web, with a 66 percent share of the United States market as of June, 2011. It is often cited that the meteoric rise of Google was largely due to the simplicity of the Google search engine. When you navigate to Google, you are presented with very little information on screen. Just the Google logo, a search box and two buttons: "Search" and "I'm Feeling Lucky." While the basic interface is simple, getting the most out of your Google queries requires a basic knowledge of search operators, the search results page and the different types of Google search.
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Search Basics
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It's easy enough to perform a basic search on Google: just visit Google.com, enter your query in the search box and click "Google Search" to view the search results page for your query or "I'm Feeling Lucky" to immediately navigate to the first search result matching your query. For best results, keep in mind that Google is a keyword-driven search engine as opposed to a natural language-driven search engine. For instance, to find the capital of New Hampshire, enter "capital New Hampshire" as your query instead of "What is the capital of New Hampshire?" Another thing to keep in mind is that Google ignores punctuation and capitalization. In short, the more precise and descriptive your search terms, the better your search results.
Search Operators
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Google provides numerous search tools designed to help you filter your search results. These tools, called search operators, can dramatically improve the effectiveness and speed of your searches. The most popular search operators include the phrase search, wherein you place your search terms in quotes to indicate that you are searching the exact phrase; exclusion terms, which allow you to exclude pages that contain certain words by placing a minus sign before the word you want to exclude; site search, a tool with which you can search within a particular website by specifying the website address; and exact terms, a utility that enables you to restrict Google from using synonyms when finding pages that match your query.
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Reviewing Results
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Google displays ten pages that the search algorithm finds to be the best fit for your search query on the initial search results page. Among the search results are numerous elements that can be used to perform a variety of different functions intended to help you integrate your Google experience with a Google account. If you are only interested in the search results, the most important aspects of the page are the sidebar and the preview buttons. The left sidebar of a search results page on Google gives you access to numerous search filters. Click "More search tools" to view additional filters that can be used to find local results or filter your results by date. To preview pages found in your search results, click the magnifying glass to the right of the page title.
Search Varieties
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Google Web search is the default engine used when you enter a query from Google but you can also search by a variety of different formats. In the left sidebar of the Google search results page, you can easily change the results page to display images, videos, news, shopping, places, blogs and more. Depending on the search type you select, Google will display the results in a more relevant fashion.
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