How to Find Anything on Google — Author Stephan Spencer's Search Tips

The good news about the internet is that it’s put the world’s information at our fingertips. For a little while, this was a Very Good Thing.

But then advertisers, marketers, bad actors, and silly people have turned the Internet into information wreckage. Once, search gave good answers. Now, it gives you nine Amazon links, three Walmart links, and weaponized propaganda. Oh, Joy.

I recently interviewed Stephan Spencer, co-author of the 997-page book The Art of SEO (Search Engine Optimization). Stephan knows how to cut through the wreckage to reveal the shining nuggets of wisdom lying beneath. He shared a few tips with me.

Once, search gave good answers. Now, it gives you nine Amazon links, three Walmart links, and weaponized propaganda. Oh, Joy.

Nobody knows about wreckage better than Thomas, a 17-year old cyborg who is dating his toaster. He’s very frustrated. They’ve had a fight, and he doesn’t know what to do. Being half machine, he’s great with logic, but doesn’t understand emotion. So he wants to turn to the internet for the answers.

But what does he search for? And how does he get the best result?

Search suggestions point the way

Use soovle.com. Start with Soovle. It kind of rhymes with “Google” ... only not really. Soovle.com isn’t a search engine. It’s a search engine of search engines. You start to type a query, and it gets suggestions for what to search for from a dozen other search engines. Then you just click on a suggestion to follow it.

Thomas gets as far as “toaster emotion” and one of the suggestions that pops up is “toaster emotional support.” Which sounds promising. When he clicks on it, however, it gives him search results that include inspiring toasters and emotional support animals. But nothing about offering a toaster emotional support.

Use quotes for phrases. Normally, search finds any web page that contains all the words in your query, even if those words are scattered around the page. And if one of the words is missing, a page might still be included if the other words are present.

You can search for an exact phrase by putting the phrase in quotes. When you use quotes, the only pages you’ll get are pages that match those exact words, in that order. Searching for "toaster emotion" gives much better results: a Facebook user named “Toaster Emotion” and a Futurama episode where Professor Farnsworth teaches a toaster to feel love. This could be the answer!...

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