Google has long since been the verb for online searching. For many of us it is the only way we search for information. In 2012 alone there were 1.2 trillion searches. Many of these will have been done directly from the familiar search bar on the home page. However you can utilise more search options by clicking on the ‘More’ tab. You can also conduct an advanced search and narrow down your results by language, region, last update, reading level, file type and more.

To access scholarly information educators point to Google Scholar or Google Books where you can preview or read books for free. For a visual look at trending searches take a look at Google Zeitgeist and an interactive map capturing what the world searched for in 2012.

Google Search Tips:

• Basic search tips
• Advanced search tips

Alternative search engines

There are however other search engines you may want to consider such as:

• Altavista
• Bing
• Blekko
• Boolify
• Boounce
• Duck Duck Go
• Hakia
• Slikk
• WolframAlpha

Images

If you are searching for images you may want to look at:

• Creative Commons Search
• Flickr (with creative commons licence)
• Shimmer (Shefffield Hallam University open resource)

(Further information on creative commons and copyright.)

Social Media

Alternatively you can use social media tools to search for information, videos, images or even people. Here a couple of examples.

YouTube is said to be the second biggest search engine, with over 72 hours of video uploaded every minute and over 800 million unique users each month. (More statistics here). Use the search bar to find videos.

LinkedIn members did more than 5.7 billion professionally-related people searches in 2012 (More statistics here). Using the drop down menu you can also search within LinkedIn for companies and groups. The advanced button allows you to drill down to detail like industry, seniority and more.

Using the search facility in any social media site is another way to find information. Adding a search button to your own blog helps others search for posts they are interested in.