Search Operators: A Comprehensive Guide

Foreword

This guide looks over some pretty cool uses and combinations of search operators, some of which I have used to gain great link opportunities for clients. Others have helped with keyword research and even recruitment!

The key thing to remember about search operators is that you need to fully understand what the search operator is actually doing and what its use is. The reason some people don’t get as much as they could out of these is that people can be unsure how to combine them efficiently to find what they are looking for online.

The operators mentioned here are referring to Google’s search queries. There is some crossover with Bing but for the purposes of this guide will only refer to Google’s SERPs. When it comes to searching within search engines it is always important to remember that there are no right or wrong results, only more or less relevant results. Search operators help you drill down on relevancy (the relevancy is subjective to what you are searching for).

I will break down the uses and give some examples of different combinations in relation to what I use them…

I have been using search operators to find great link building opportunities for years now. When searching, I still actively look for niche directory-based directories that accept submissions for websites. I personally don’t like to think of these as directories as such because when I think directory I, along with some of you I’m sure, imagine low-quality sites. However, some that can be found can really help the authority of the site you are working with and some niches have some extremely relevant directory-based sites. Below lists some basic search operators with commentary on why the operator is used in that context.

Guest Blogs

Before we start searching for these sites, you need to make sure that you have a certain set of criteria when analysing a website for guest content placement. Below are some non-exhaustive criteria I like to use:

1. Is the blog there for the sole purpose of advertising?
2. Are there clear contact details for the author(s)?
3. Is there an author page?
4. Are there guest posts listed as sponsored posts?
5. Does the blog have irrelevant or keyword anchor text links in the sidebar/footer?
6. Do the articles themselves always have followed & exact match keyword anchor text heavy links?
7. Is the author’s name attributed to the posts or is it simply posted by admin?
8. Does the content within the articles read naturally or does it look like it has just been stuffed with keywords?
9. Are the articles on the site all original content or are the duplicated across the site or Internet in general?
10. When was the site last cached?

For more references I have linked out to a few posts and resources on guest blogging;

• Article from Search Engine Watch about recent guest blogging practices
• Matt Cutts’ view on the current state of affairs in guest blogging and how NOT to do it
• 5 techniques you should stop using when conducting a guest blogging campaign

inurl:law "guest post"

What this operator does

This search operator finds websites with the keyword “law” with the URL of the pages. This operator can generally return more specific legal websites than the above intitle operator. I use the word can because it could still find some examples of non-specific law-related websites that might just have a law section within the site. Again, it will also find sites that have the keywords guest post so is another useful one for the toolbox!

law inurl:guest-post

What this operator does

This search operator is searching for pages that contain the keyword law but actually contain the words guest post within the URL, I have made use of the hyphen in between the keywords as this is generally how it would be separated in the URL (there are other separators but this is the most common – an underscore would be the next choice). This operator is another variation of finding guest blog opportunities for your client.

inurl:".gov.uk" "add your business"

What this operator does

Similar to the above, but the difference is that it searches for sites that specifically contain .gov.uk in the URL. This search does provide different results! I’ve also left the keyword law out of the search to broaden the search.

inurl:"edu" "add site"

What this operator does

Pretty much the same as the .gov operator above it, this one finds sites that contain .edu in the URL and also that contain the phrase add site. This doesn’t always mean you will find .edu directories – it’s likely you will but you might have to dig deeper than the first page of results.

.edu sites are generally US-based but it’s still worth mentioning 🙂

intitle:firecask -site:firecask.com

What this operator does

This operator finds mentions of firecask in page titles of external sites but excludes results from the FireCask website itself. This is a great operator because the results shown generally will be articles on external websites about your brand. If your brand is similar to another online brand then you may see some results that are not as relevant, but on the whole, it’s a useful operator to use.

If an external website has written an article on your brand online but not linked out to you this is again another easy way to request a citation link. Since the websites have written articles about your brand it makes sense for them to link to you.

intext:"alex moss" firecask.com -site:firecask.com

What this operator does

This search operator looks for the keyword alex moss as well as firecask.com but excludes the FireCask website itself. This is useful if you are following an author or journalist who contributes to external websites. It can also be used to find mentions of your name on external sites. If it is a good unlinked mention then you can always politely ask for a link.

site:linkedin.com seo account manager "manchester"

What this operator does

Similar to the above, but this time we have been more specific with the search. Notice how I have left the quotes out on the keyword seo account manager – I’ve done this because I wanted to catch related broader match terms as well as specific SEO account managers in Manchester.

site:plus.google.com intext:occupation "seo"

What this operator does

This time we are searching Google+ for people whose occupation mentions SEO. We can add in location after this to give more specific results as required…

Subdomain Checking Operator

site:debenhams.com -www.

What this operator does

This operator enables us to see if a website has any other subdomains besides its root. It excludes all results that contain www. and returns all results without. One good use of this on a site could be if, for example, you have a development subdomain or any subdomains that you don’t want to be indexed, this search will show you all subdomains that are in Google’s index.

Depending on how many indexed pages a site has this might not be a feasible way to check but its good to give you an overview look at the index.

site:docs.google.com "search engine optimisation" OR "seo"

What this operator does

This search operator allows us to search through publicly available documents online hosted within Google Drive. Again we can look for resources, content etc. If you are lucky you can find some really great information using this search 🙂

Conclusion

I hope you have all enjoyed reading this as much as I have writing it – the key takeaway here is to be really creative with these search operators. Use my examples as a starter template, then have a go at trying different results using combinations and other creative methods to see what you come up with.

Until next time 🙂