Real use Cases for Google Advanced Queries.

You ever wonder how people figure out how to get the right information online quickly? Maybe they're lucky or maybe they're just good with search queries. Its like they know how to talk to Google. You know, you ever watch CSI, or NCIS or any of those detective shows... even Columbo. Google is like one of the informants in one of the shows, or the file keeper at the records office... he knows all the stuff, all the secrets and all the dirt on anything and anybody. He'll tell you easily if you just ask, but if you ask the right questions, he will tell you so much more.

You can easily practice each time you search and there are tons of guides out there. Instead of giving you a guide of the different operators, I thought I'd give you a list of actual search queries that can save you time and help you find exactly what you're looking for.

Try this one.

I was looking for an app for a client, a finance app to be exact. The requirements were very simple and part of the requirements were to find apps that had similar features and worked across a variety of systems. This is actually in fact a very popular query if you start to abstract it. Lets take a look:

You might start with a search like this:

accounting app for macs

And it is clear what you're asking, show me accounting apps for macs. Pretty straight forward right? Its actually a good search, but this would be so much better:

The first query is really simple, it simply rolls of your tongue and flows straight to your keyboard. The second query is a bit more complicated. As we break it down, you'll find that it actually is a combination query that gives you a greater amount of focused results. Let me explain what is going on.

First our main keyword no trick or anything:
"accounting"

Second, we have our combination of other search terms. These include a variety of names that people might use to refer to a program or app. Notice how they are all surrounded by parentheses "( )" and separated by a symbol called a pipe like this: "|". The pipe means "or" so that our search translates like this:

Search for accounting and then for app, OR, program, OR utility, OR extension OR "add on", OR addon, OR plugin all at the same time.