Heavens to Murgatroyd!!! (Sidenote: When I typed this phrase, I decided that I had to find the origin of the phrase…check it out here).
When I do some Google searches, the sheer abundance of information (or irrelevant information) can be overwhelming. While I might try to refine my search terms to better narrow the results, there are times when the sheer volume can still ‘drown out’ the information you’re seeking. Is there a way to better narrow down the results (besides adding more keywords)? Of course, there is!
Here’s how you can do it…
First, run your search as you normally would using the best search string you can think of to obtain the results you’re looking for. NOW, look at the left side of the screen (that’s real estate that I often don’t notice…I’m too busy looking at the results themselves).
You’ll notice that there are a number of ways to narrow the search. If you’re looking for news articles only, just click the ‘News’ icon. Want blog postings, click ‘Blog’. Etc.
Those aren’t the best filters in my mind…to me the BEST filter is down in the ‘Any Time’ area lower on the page – CUSTOM RANGE.
Just click on this, and enter any date range you want, or just a ‘from’ or a ‘to’ date. You don’t need to fill in both. For information posted BEFORE January 1, 2005, enter ‘1/1/2005’ in the ‘To’ field. That’s all you have to do. Irrelevant results are instantly removed from your listing.
There’s some much more complicated way to limit Google results, but I’ll use the tools they give me anytime!!
Happy Searching!!
2 Comments
Wow. Didn’t know that! I’ll give it a go. I’m still astounded at all the pages that are in a response to a search and I rarely get past page 1, although they do lose their relevance quickly. Thanks Sandy!
…and you can get dragged down a rabbit-hole that had NOTHING to do with what you were originally searching for :-), can’t you. Your comment also is a great indicator of the importance of your own companies goods and services showing up on page 1 of search results for relevant search queries – most people don’t go past page 1.