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perators, reverse image searches, and visual thinking, you can make progress in your investigations.” — <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/searchbistro/">Henk van Ess.</a></p></blockquote><p id="8d28">Here are the 6 tricks that can help you in your writing work:</p><h2 id="c6d4">1. Connections</h2><p id="a418">It is possible to reveal the connection between a person and some kind of phenomenon or circumstances. Add the AROUND operator in capital letters and choose the distance between these words in the text, based on the expected context. If you are looking for two terms in a title, then for English you can take 7. In the normal text within a sentence — 17, if you find in one paragraph — 30.</p><p id="7549">Example: digital painting AROUND(2) tools</p><h2 id="7270">2. Social media</h2><p id="35a5">Just add @ symbol before your query to make the search on the social network.</p><p id="872d">Example: Haiti earthquake @ facebook</p><h2 id="6bca">3. Picture/ Video</h2><p id="4e7f">If you need to learn more about a picture or video, when you have a link on this video you can insert a link into a Google search, but exclude the platform where you found it. For example, to find the primary source of a video that you found on Youtube put the link in the search bar and add the following operator: -site: youtube.com.</p><h2 id="6f6b">4. Map</h2><p id="0033">If you need to find a map, look at what words are generally found on the maps. Find keywords by example. The word “map” will not always be indicated on them, but the word “scale” is very common, so you can use the word “scale” and other keywords to find the desired map.</p><h2 id="1f95">5. Right search terms</h2><p id="6df9">When you are stuck in your research, try to think out of the box. When you want to find an interview, don’t go easy and type “interview”. Look for words that will definitely appear. You can hardly f

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ind interviews by the word “interview”. Instead, look for what exactly should appear. For example, to find an interview with a specific person, look for the words “ name of person said” and “I” — in quotes and with a space after the pronoun.</p><h2 id="d0be">6. Set the stage</h2><p id="1f96">Add the words you want to find, and minus the ones you want to exclude. A great example of usage of such a term is when you want to dig into some myths or misinformation. If you want to find some additional information about a particular fact, where it is coming from or who is associated with it, you can follow<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UGMBvUue1Hg"> an example from the webinar</a> for investigative journalists. The goal was to find a scientist who was spreading some false information. To do so the advice was to use asterisks in the place of the name in the search query. Example: “doctor * * who said …”. Google will replace asterisks as wildcards with first and last names. You can also exclude results with the information you already know by putting minus symbol, like “- *name of person”” (if you know the name, but don’t want to have it in your results)</p><p id="ccb9">There are obviously many more other advanced tricks of Google search that you might find useful. If you want to learn more, you can find some ideas of Advanced Search Operators <a href="https://ahrefs.com/blog/google-advanced-search-operators/">here</a>.</p><p id="879f">However, if you adopt only these few pieces of advice that were mentioned in this article, you might facilitate your life and work. But as with any skill, you should practice it. Try some of the tricks for your next article and see how it works. If it doesn’t return the results you expect, try again. You might need some practice in thinking visually and out of the box to find correct and “working” search terms.</p></article></body>

6 useful search tricks for writers

Writers need to master all possible tools at their disposal. Knowing how to put words together on paper is not enough. You need to do your research, find some quality sources, add few good visuals to illustrate your point.

Not all writers need to do investigations about subjects they write about, but preliminary research is always important. And here we can borrow conceptual thinking and the toolbox of visual search of investigative journalists.

Most of us know some basic tricks to refine a Google search. For example, if you are looking for the source of the quote you should put the exact phrase in quotation marks. However few people know the tricks to go further and to use all the possibilities that Google search can offer.

Experts' advice is to change the approach, start thinking in a new way, combining computer logic, visualization, exclusion of the known, and patience on the thorny path of trial and error.

Visual thinking isn’t just about using search terms. It is important to determine what needs to be found, remove what is already known, and use the most logical method for finding the necessary data, even if you have to use an image to search for text.

“Through various clever Google operators, reverse image searches, and visual thinking, you can make progress in your investigations.” — Henk van Ess.

Here are the 6 tricks that can help you in your writing work:

1. Connections

It is possible to reveal the connection between a person and some kind of phenomenon or circumstances. Add the AROUND operator in capital letters and choose the distance between these words in the text, based on the expected context. If you are looking for two terms in a title, then for English you can take 7. In the normal text within a sentence — 17, if you find in one paragraph — 30.

Example: digital painting AROUND(2) tools

3. Picture/ Video

If you need to learn more about a picture or video, when you have a link on this video you can insert a link into a Google search, but exclude the platform where you found it. For example, to find the primary source of a video that you found on Youtube put the link in the search bar and add the following operator: -site: youtube.com.

5. Right search terms

When you are stuck in your research, try to think out of the box. When you want to find an interview, don’t go easy and type “interview”. Look for words that will definitely appear. You can hardly find interviews by the word “interview”. Instead, look for what exactly should appear. For example, to find an interview with a specific person, look for the words “ *name of person* said” and “I” — in quotes and with a space after the pronoun.

6. Set the stage

Add the words you want to find, and minus the ones you want to exclude. A great example of usage of such a term is when you want to dig into some myths or misinformation. If you want to find some additional information about a particular fact, where it is coming from or who is associated with it, you can follow an example from the webinar for investigative journalists. The goal was to find a scientist who was spreading some false information. To do so the advice was to use asterisks in the place of the name in the search query. Example: “doctor * * who said …”. Google will replace asterisks as wildcards with first and last names. You can also exclude results with the information you already know by putting minus symbol, like “- *name of person”” (if you know the name, but don’t want to have it in your results)

There are obviously many more other advanced tricks of Google search that you might find useful. If you want to learn more, you can find some ideas of Advanced Search Operators here.

However, if you adopt only these few pieces of advice that were mentioned in this article, you might facilitate your life and work. But as with any skill, you should practice it. Try some of the tricks for your next article and see how it works. If it doesn’t return the results you expect, try again. You might need some practice in thinking visually and out of the box to find correct and “working” search terms.