Many SEOs aren’t aware of the fact that they can find a lot of useful SEO information right on Google. They just need to know how to search for the information they need using the right search operators.
And we will be explaining exactly that in this short post.
And we will be explaining exactly that in this short post.
Basic Search Operators
The basic search operators and punctuations help you find information that can be indirectly useful for your SEO campaigns. Let’s quickly take a look at them below.
Site:This search operator helps you find all the pages indexed for a particular site. So for instance, performing a search with “site:SEOOptimizers.com” will help you find all the pages that have been indexed by Google for SEO Optimizers.
Link:This search operator can be a great way to find all pages that are linking to a particular site. So searching for “link:YouTube.com” will pull up all pages that are linking to any page of YouTube.com.
Related: This search operator is a great way to find sites that are similar to the one you already know. So if you search for “related:YouTube.com”, you will find all sites that are very similar to YouTube.com.
OR: Sometimes, you need to search for pages that talk about either of the two things you have in mind. This search operator allows you to do that. Example: You can search for “OR: SEO OR PPC” to find results that are talking about either SEO or PPC.
Info: This search operator allows you to find the cached version of a page or site, and some other useful information as well.
Useful Punctuations
Now, a quick look at some useful punctuations:
@ –Use this simple punctuation on Google to find all the social results for a particular brand of the company. Example: Searching for “@shralpin” will help you find all the social media profiles related to Shralpin.
$ –Use this punctuation to find the product you’re searching for in a particular price range. Example: If you perform a search using “Nikon $400”, Google will list all the pages that have a Nikon camera selling for $400 or less.
# –Performing a search using this punctuation is probably the easiest way to find popular hashtags for topics that are currently popular or trending.
Advanced Search Operators
Now, let’s get to some advanced search operators that might help you directly with building your SEO strategies:
Allinanchor: This search operator helps you find pages that link out to another site using a specific anchor text. So for example, searching for “allinanchor: Best SEO Company” will make Google return all pages that are linking to another page on a different site using the words “Best,” “SEO,” and “Company.”
Allintext: Looking to limit your search to only those pages that include some specific text? Then the “allintext” search operator is what you need to use. Example: “Allintext:SEO Checklist” will find you results that have the words “SEO” and “Checklist” as part of their text.
Allintitle: This works in the same way as the above search operator but is just limited to the title of the page, and not the page’s text.
