Google Search Operators Queries : Make Your Search Easy

In this time of technology and internet savvy world, it is quite obvious that you must have to use search engines specially Google very frequently. Whenever you need to find information on anything whether it is online shopping portal, design services, graphics services or anything else, you would always get one name in your mind to find the needed information and this name is – Google, yes the best and most used search engine in the whole world. Google gives you really good results however still it is not human and cannot read exact human behavior and works on algorithm or code written by programmers, so sometimes it can show irrelevant results as well. So to get better and accurate results you need to be very specific to Google and you can do so by making your query even more precise by using Google’s helping search operators.

Please have a look to the compiled list below for all useful search operators that can make searching really useful and easy.

Note: Some search operators may not work properly due to extra spacing in between operator and the query-terms.

1.   allinanchor :

Before moving to the explanation of this operator I would like to tell you what an anchor is? An anchor is actually a text which is hyperlinked, Like if you home page is linked to your about us page with the Text “About Us” then “About Us” is called as anchor text.

Syntax for “allinanchortext”

allinanchortext:query-term

This operator tells Google to return pages which are having the query-term (mentioned by you with allinanchortext:) in anchor text of the links of the returned pages. Suppose you put your query as follows in Google:

allinanchortext:car wallpapers

After this the Google will display those pages which are having “car” and “wallpaper” in the anchor text of the links on the returned pages.

2.   allintext :

Syntax for “allintext”:

allintext:query-term

When you use this operator then Google returns those pages only which will be having the above mentioned query-terms in the text part of the page.

Suppose you type following keywords in Google:

allintext:top restaurant NewYork

Then the returned results will display those pages only which are having the query words, means “top”, “restaurant” and “NewYork” in the text of those pages.

3.   allintitle :

This particular search operator will tell Google to fetch those web pages which will be including the query terms (specified by you) in the title of the page. Suppose the query we type in Google is:

allintitle:travel destination

This query will show the results which are having terms “travel” and destination” in the Title of the pages.

4.   allinurl :

If you are going to use “allinurl:” operator in your search then Google will show those results which will be having your mentioned terms in URL of the page. Let’s say your query is:

allinurl:seo tips

Then you will get the pages which will be having words “Seo” and “tips” in their url for example: http://www.page1.com/top-seo-tips.html

5.   author :

When this query operator is used then Google will be showing you the pages from Google Groups search results to display articles written by the author mentioned by you with “author:” operator.

Suppose you use following query in Google Search box:

Recipe author:mary author:suan
or
Recipe author:mary@emailaddressprovider.com

This will result in those pages which are having word “recipe” and are written by “May Suan” or “mary@emailaddressprovider.com”

So as you see author name can be full name or first or last name only or email address as well. For specifying both first and last name you must use two “author:” operators.

6.   Define :

“define:” operator will show you the pages with definition of the keyword specified by you. This is particularly very helpful in searching the definition of the words you want to look for.

7.   Filetype :

When you use “filetype:” operator then it returns those pages which have files with extension mentioned with “filetype:”.

Suppose you have entered the search term as:

Nano Technology filetype:ppt

It will display Power Presentation Files means PPT files whihch are having words “Nano” and “Technology” within them.

8.   Ext :

ext: command is used the same way as is “filetype:” just like an alias.

9.   intext :

The search operator “intext:” will return the results with those pages which are going to have the specified query-term in the text of the webpage.

Let’s take an example that you enter following search query in Google:

Beauty Products intext:delivery

This will display the pages which contains “delivery” in the text of the page and words “beauty” and “products” in any part of the document being in title, url or anything else.

There should not be any space between the “intext:” and the query word you need to search for. For specifying more than one term you can use intext: for more than once as well or can use “allintext:” as well as a replacement.

10.   intitle :

“intitle:” search operator works same as “allintitle:” returning pages which are having the specified query term after “intitle:” in the title of the returned web pages.

Again it shouldn’t have any space between the “intitle:” and the query term. Just like as mentioned above in case of “intext:”. It can be used more than once for specifying more than one word or you can replace it with “allintitle:” for combining multiple query terms with one search operators

11.   inurl :

“inurl:” is again almost same as that of “allinurl:” means returning pages that have specified query-term in the URL of the page itself.

Again no spaces are allowed between inurl: and the query-term.

For specifying more than one query term you can use “inurl:” command more than once like:

inurl:seo inurl:tips

It would work the same way as following one:

allinurl:seo tips

12.   inanchor :

If you are using “inanchor:” in your search query then it will limit the results to those WebPages only which will contain the query-term (mentioned by you with “inurl:” ) in anchor text of the links on those WebPages.

There must not be space again between “inanchor:” and the query-term. For specifying more keywords or terms you can use “inanchor:” more than once or can specify it using “aalinanchor:” command.

13.   Link :

The command link:websiteurl will return those pages that are containing link for websiteurl. Suppose you want to search the pages which contains link to this site named www.saifullahbutt.com then you will enter following query in Google:

link:www.saifullahbutt.com

And it will return all those pages that will contain links to www.saifullahbutt.com

14.   Related :

This query search operator will be having following syntax:

Related:URL

This will fetch all the WebPages which are similar to the site mentioned by you in your query with “related:” operator.

15.   Site:

If you are going to use “site:” command then it will return you the results specifically from the same domain only which you would mention after “site:” operator.

Suppose you put following query in Google.

Help site:www.saifullahbutt.com

Then it will be going to return these pages from www.saifullahbutt.com only which contains the word help.

You can also use most of these operators by using “advanced search” option of Google. I am sure you are going to love the results returned by these operators and your search results will really be refined to a great level.

Try these operators and let me know about your experience. Also you are most welcome to contribute to the list. Thank you.

Saif Ullah is an SEO & Internet Marketing expert working as a social media marketing manager. He loves to play with gadgets and Google. He has been running Saif Ullah Butt for sharing his personal adventures in Internet life. You can catch him on Facebook. Do you want some guidelines in SEO ? Get Quote Now for SEO !