EMP General Library Resources: Using Google Effectively

General Tips

• Google defaults to an “AND” Boolean search for all your keywords

• To force a common word (the, a, an, how, where, why) to be included in the search use +word 

• or “your search phrase”

  • OR is still “OR” 

  • For “NOT” try a “-word”

  • For synonyms try “~word”  

  • Wildcard *  “word * word”

Even MORE Tips...

Some advanced Google search operators can be found in a comprehensive list here (courtesy MIT Libraries):
https://libguides.mit.edu/c.php?g=176061&p=5592001

More Tips...

• I’m Feeling Lucky takes you directly to the first web page Google returned for your query 

• Limit keywords to title, URL or text

  • allintitle: (allintitle:word)

  • site: (word site:www.blech.com)

• Ordering of keywords

  • The first word gets the most importance.

  • Reorder words if your search doesn’t bring what you want it to 

• Repetition of keywords

  • Repeating words gives them more importance.  Repeat the second word to give it equal weight as the first.