A better way to use search engines
By including these various operators (+, -) pieces of punctuations (“ “) and simple words (OR) in your search terms benefits you in two ways. i) You spend less time searching and ii) You will find exactly what you want
Quotes
Let’s assume you’re using Google to find a supplier for your online business – specifically a supplier of left-handed scissors. If you simply type in the word ‘scissors’, then you'll have 15,000,000+ pages to look at. Oh dear!
But you’re looking for a much more specific type of scissor – left-handed ones to be precise. By entering the term left-handed scissors wrapped in double quotes – i.e., “left-handed scissors”, Google will then present you with only those pages containing that phrase, of which there are (just!) 24,000+.
So when a search term contains more than one word, save yourself time and wrap the term in quotes.
But hold on - you forgot to tell Google that you’re only interested in buying left handed ‘Dressmaking’ scissors as distinct to left-handed sewing scissors, children’s scissors or cuticle scissors or any other kind of left-handed scissor come to that.
There are two ways you make your search term even more specific:
Excluding certain words
1. Place a minus (-) in front of the words you wish to exclude from your search. Enter “left-handed scissors” in the usual way followed by –sewing -children’s –cuticle. Google would then find you only those pages containing the phrase ‘left-handed scissors’ and would exclude any pages where the words ‘sewing’, ‘children’s’, or ‘cuticle’ appear.
2. Enter the phrase “left-handed dressmaking scissors”. Google would then find pages where that phrase appears but it wouldn’t exclude pages carrying the words sewing, children’s and cuticle.
Including certain words
Now say you change your mind and you decide that you are going to sell left-handed dressmaking, sewing, children’s and cuticle scissors. In which case, enter “left-handed scissors” and then add plus signs (+) as follows +dressmaking +sewing +children’s +cuticle. Google would then find pages where the phrase left-handed scissors appears and the words dressmaking, sewing, children’s and cuticle.
Hedging your bets
Maybe you want left-handed shears as well as left-handed scissors? Just include the word OR (as it is, no quotes, completely unadorned) in your search – e.g., “left-handed shears” OR “left-handed scissors” and Google will find the pages you’re looking for.