Three ways to find a cool deal using Google
February 7th, 2010(This guest post is by Ann Smarty, a search engine geek, social media enthusiast and a passionate blogger. She has recently started a community of guest bloggers, so if you have a blog and want to promote it for absolutely free, go help Ann build the valuable tool for that by joining and participating.)
Bargain hunting is only effective when done right otherwise you find yourself using a coupon whenever you are aware of one (which causes even more spending) or always forgetting to use a coupon (how many of us first buy something and only then remember they saw a deal for the same product in another store?).
Anyway, here’s my point: to take advantage of special offers, you don’t need to be a bargain hunter (meaning that you don’t need to keep track of all the deals and coupons around the web). All you need is to know how to find a good deal only when you need one.
And, quite naturally, when it comes to searching, Google is more often than not the only tool you will ever need. So here are the 3 (somewhat advanced) Google search tricks to help you find a good timely deal:
1. Search for Synonyms and Related Words
Various sites can use various words to call its special offer: a bargain, a coupon, a sale, etc, etc. To make sure you include all those in your search results, try the following tricks:
1. ~ operator
This search operator will include all synonyms which it refers to, for example [laptop ~coupon] will include [laptop promotion], [laptop deals], [laptop sale], etc and even [laptop free shipping]:
2. OR operator
If you want search results to include any of the terms you mention, use OR between them, for example laptop (coupons OR deals OR promotions):
3. * operator
If you are unsure what exactly you want to search (for example, you don’t know which exactly computer you plan to buy), use * (wildcard) operator. Google will substitute it for one or more related words. For example, [ "* laptops coupons" (with the quotes) will include Dell laptops coupons, cheap laptops coupons, instant laptops coupons, etc:
2. Search For the Recent Results
One of the search options I use most of the time is Google's date search: it is accessed via clicking "Show options" link above the search results. It opens up a search side panel which contains the following options:
- Latest (to see real-time search results from social media sites like Twitter);
- Past 24 hours (to see pages created/updated over the past 24 hours);
- Past week (to see pages created/updated over the past week);
- Past year (to see pages created/updated over the past year);
- Specific date range (to choose the time frame).
These options are an awesome help if you need to find most recent search results (in our case, to find fresh deals and newest coupons).
3. Search Within a Site
We all have our favorite sites when it comes to any daily tasks and interests. For example, for me, Google is the only tool to do web search (I never need to use any other) and Buxr is the only site to locate a shopping deal. For the maximum efficiency, I just need to combine the two.
Google's SITE: operator allows to restrict your search to any given domain, for example [site:buxr.com], plus you can take advantage of any search tip listed above:
Why do I need to search within any site using Google? It is simple: Google offers plenty of unique search options no other site has: besides the two most awesome ones mentioned above, there are other advanced search operators as well as advanced search features and recent advances. With Google’s SITE: operator, you get the freedom to use all those great search opportunities to search any site.
So the fact is, Google is a nice service in itself but when used to its full capacity it becomes your #1 tool no matter what you need to do.
