It’s an understatement to state the Google search engine has by far the most influence over today’s web behaviors. Google claims to receive over 1 billion searches each day. Also, 15% of those 1 billion searches each day, they’ve never seen before. This means that web search is ever-evolving- and being El Presidente of internet search- Google’s developed “advanced search operators” to help searchers cut through the clutter.

For this installment of the JT Creative blog, we thought it’d be fun to speak on some little known, advanced commands that help online marketers complete complex research…or… empower the casual searcher with a tool belt to impress their peers. Maybe it’s not “hacker-status,” but using these search commands will put you in the 99th percentile of efficient Google-searchers, easy.

Diving right in – Below we’ve listed an assortment of Google Search Operators to help you upgrade your search game. Keep in mind, we’ve limited our list to operators that only work when conducting a web search (as opposed to image, news, or directory searches…etc)

1. allintext:

Using the operator allintext:term will restrict the results that Google lists to only webpages that contain the terms you’ve listed. For example, searching “allintext:jacob tyler creative group” will show you pages where the term(s) “Jacob Tyler Creative Group” are found. Pretty basic, yeah? Let’s continue.

2. filetype:

When searching with the operator filetype:suffix Google will only result listings that are the desired file type of your choosing. Replacing “suffix” with the filetype you wish to find. PDF, DOC, PAGES, XLSX…etc. Example: Entering a search of “web design san diego filetype:pdf” will list Adobe Acrobat pdf files that contain the terms “web,” “design,” “san,” and “diego.” To include more than one filetype, combine this search with the OR operator command. Example: “web design san diego filetype:pdf OR filetype:doc OR filetype:pages” Now you’re catching on.

3. related:

A search including the operator related:URL will list only websites related to the URL you determine. An example, you say? …I thought you’d never ask. Well, let’s say you enter the query, ”related:www.jacobtyler.com” Google would present only listings that are similar to the characteristics of Jacob Tyler. Note: using URLs without the “www.” prefix will work just as well (ex: related:jacobtyler.com)

4. define:

I bet you can’t guess what the operator define:term does? Define things? Damn. Good guess. Certainly a valuable shortcut, if you’re like me. I use this operator to see multiple definitions of a word or even explanations of popular phrases. Obligatory example – Using the search “define:murphys law” will land you a concise definition of something I’m sure we all run into quite regularly. But let’s hope not.

As far as Search Operators in existence, we haven’t even begun to scratch the surface. But hey- Now that we’ve shed a little light unto some of them, it’ll be easier to do your own research and find the rest, right?

Happy Googling everyone.

The relatively new, popular IOS app, Vine, is coming to Android “soon” for all you Android fanatics. The Vine app sort of duplicates Instagram in a sense that the user interface on both apps look similar – except that Vine allows 6 second motion videos. Cool, right? For those of you who are just getting the hang of the Vine app – start-ups, celebrity artists, and well established companies have gotten a head start to using Vine to their advantage. Shoot, even the White House has posted a Vine! Vine stated that they’ve also submitted an app update to the Apple App Store, that will start allowing users to tag friends in videos as well as the ability to embed videos on any website. As Vine is making moves in terms of enhancing the app, I’m sure there are other moves they can make to make this app even more engaging. It’d be pretty neat to have filters for the app to give these mini video clips a cooler look.

Aside from the app’s features, what could this mean for social campaign and SEO? As I mentioned earlier – start-ups, celebrities, companies, and brands have been using Vine to engage with their fans and consumers more intimately. With the increasing number of mobile users, this is a huge opportunity for many brands and businesses. C’mon, the White House posted a Vine. *moment of silence” Yep, shout out to the President. This new form of communication and marketing is definitely exciting. It only makes sense to invest and take advantage of this mobile app with all these mobile users on their phones these days. With Vine making it’s way into the Android phone, we can only imagine all the more creativity we’ll be seeing.

Snapchat’s CEO Evan Spiegal, spoke at an event in NYC on Tuesday to discuss the mobile app’s success and reputation. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Snapchat, it allows users to take & send photos (and short videos) to other Snapchat connections. The catch? The recipient can only see the image or video for a short, predetermined matter of seconds. After the view-timer expires, it’s gone – forever. Well, kind of. The only way to keep a hold on the short-lived picture is to screenshot while viewing it. Although, in that case, Snapchat will notifiy the sender that their recipient has screenshot their image. No way of being sneaky here!

But moving along, this new (and sometimes risque) messaging platform has a unique view when discussing its millions of users’ personal data. In short, Spiegal believes, “Delete is the Default.” Basically, not keeping record of the images sent each day is a direction Spiegal thinks will become the new trend for contemporary app developers. In order to keep the integrity of the platform for each user, it’s important to keep data-anonymity.

This raises concern from marketers: what do explorative social media marketers, advertisers, etc. learn and leverage in terms of psychographic and demographic data? Essentially, if there’s no record of past data, how can we learn, improve and correct mistakes from the past?

We get it, it “acknowledges personal growth” by not having to look back at embarrassing photos from years ago. But to be honest, looking back at embarrassing photos is an even better way to acknowledge personal growth. Don’t you think?

Charlize Theron

Lil Jon

Brad Pitt

So whether you agree or disagree to hoarding a bunch of data from the past, Snapchat still serves as a fun, new way of sending creative pictures and videos.
Happy Snapchatting all!

Watch and be impressed. #smartmarketing