
One-phrase search: If you have a phrase that is often attributed to your main topic, then you can use this in search engines.This might be a word that is in your research title or a certain item you need to know more about to be prepared for a presentation. One-word search: The simplest way to use a search engine is to type in one word that is crucial to your search.This will reduce your research time and ensure the sites in the list will help you with your project. To maximize the efficiency of your search engine search, you need to use strategies that help you find the most relevant results first. This happens because search engines all have different rules about how the search engine results will be listed. When you first use a search engine to look up the answer to a question or to begin a research project, you will notice something: Some of the results you receive are relevant and some are not. Interested in learning more? Why not take an online Basic Research Skills course? The Internet has a lot of information, and a main part of your research process will be sifting through your findings to determine what is useful. Though you might have a clear idea in mind of the questions you need to answer, you need to work with the search engine to ensure you can find the best possible information. Now that you know how a search engine basically operates, you can begin to see how you need to work with the search engine to find the pages and Web sites you need for your individual research. These popularity rankings might change between search engines or they might change over the course of a week, depending on the popularity of a Web site. Why is this? More people decided to choose that Web site over weight loss product Web sites, so the search engine ranks it higher.

For example, when you look up weight loss, you might find a site that talks about the health-related aspects of weight loss, rather than an actual weight loss plan. Popularity: What you might not realize is that search engines also will rank Web sites based on how popular they are with users.For example, when you want to look something up about dieting, you do not type in "carrot." You type in "diet" or "dieting." Search engines have complicated algorithms to determine what keywords match best to Web sites online. Search engines rank the sites online by the keywords that are most related to the Web sites, as well as to keywords that are used most often on those sites. You can type in a word that is related to your topic, a title of a book, an author, a question, or any other number of words to find results that are related to your search. Keywords: Search engines operate much like a computer at a library might.Subpages: Within those pages might be even more subpages, helping you further refine your search and find the results that you need to complete your research.This allows the site to break up into additional pages so a person can reach different pieces of information. Domain details: After the domain name, you might see additional words, often after a back slash (/).If you typed in another spelling into a Web browser, you would not reach this site. If you were to type this name into a browser or search engine, you would find a listing for the Apple site.

For example, you might have This is Apple's Web site name.

While search engines are complex in the way they arrange their information, this is the basic setup. It is much easier to use one search engine than to use several.

In collecting your information, assess how quickly the search engine can get to your needed materials and then choose the search engine that works consistently for you. Many people choose one search engine before all others, and you might choose to do the same. No matter what search engine you decide to use, you will find a vast collection of resources. You can use a variety of different search engines to help you begin your research, including: Within millions of domain names are stored pieces of information you can use for your research.īrowser: The browser is the entryway to your Internet searches. An Internet search engine is akin to a library in the online setting.
