Google's Advanced Operators

Google has a list of advanced operators popular among the SEO community. However, most web site owners are not aware of these, so I will take the time to explain what they are and how they work.

These operators are used as part of your search, requesting certain information from the search engine:

This one is popular. [ LINK: ]. Using this along with you domain name will show you who is linked to you. Typing "link:http://www.mysite.com" in the Google search bar will return links pointing to your site. This will show you who is linking to you. Do not place a space between link and the address, and be sure to add http:// to your domain name. Results may not show otherwise.

Another great operator is [ INURL: ]. This will restrict your search to one site only. Typing "inurl:www.mr-seo.com Joe Balestrino" will return results for Joe Balestrino only on www.mr-seo.com This is great if you are looking for a specific phrase on a site.

The [INTITLE: ] operator will return web sites that have the requested keyword or phrase in their title tag. For example, "intitle: keyword". If you have several keywords, you could enter "allintitle: keyword phrases". This will search for all listed keywords in the title.

Another useful operator is [ CACHE: ]. If you enter "cache:www.mysite.com book" you will see the web page with the word book highlighted. You can also just type "cache:www.mysite.com". This will just show you how the site looked when it was last cached – good if you want to see at what point your site was last indexed.

To learn about other Google operators, visit http://www.google.com/help/operators.html.
Some operators work on other search engines as well, so try them out. Memorize these operators to help speed up -- and narrow down – your every day searches. But more importantly, use them to keep track of your SEO efforts as well as your competitors.

For more information on SEO visit http://mr-seo.blogspot.com. For Joe's Affordable SEO service visit his site at www.mr-seo.com. Joe is also a merger-partner of Web Presence, a full-service web design firm exclusively serving small businesses nationwide. Visit his web site at: http://www.jnb-design.com.