With Google search, it is possible to narrow down the search immediately. By using the minus sign (or hyphen), it is possible to eliminate terms from the search results.

For example, you may want to look for information on the city of Kobe. If you enter the term ‘Kobe’ in the Google search engine, you will find a multitude of basketball references and L.A. Lakers references. This is far from what you are needing but it does reflect what most people are searching for when they enter the word ‘Kobe’ into the search.

It is possible to eliminate terms in this Kobe search. To eliminate basketball references, enter: ‘kobe’ and then enter ‘-basketball’. It would look like this: [kobe -basketball]. There is no space between the minus sign and the term to be eliminated. Perhaps there is more that needs to be eliminated. You may want to eliminate ‘lakers’. So the query to Google would be: [kobe -lakers -basketball]. If you enter those three terms, as written but without the brackets, then you will find that the City of Kobe is the first search result that is shown.

This saves time. The initial search results with just the term ‘kobe’ will generate what you need. However, it will require your time to look through the search results. With using the minus sign, much of what you did not need is eliminated. Then Google has a chance to present exactly what you need on the first result page. It really does save time.

Catherine Forsythe
Director of Operations
FlyingHamster:  http://flyinghamster.com/

[tag]google, minus sign, hyphen, eliminating terms, search, efficiency, query[/tag]