About the author: Hey there! I’m Nik, 23, and a German student on his way to becoming an entrepreneur – and happy! Most of all, I believe in 2 things: 1. We all must learn, in order to become happy. 2. Helping others by providing value to their lives. That means if I can help you learn something today, it’s a double win for both of us! I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did writing it. If you have any questions while reading this book, please reach out to me on Twitter, facebook, or shoot me a quick email. If you don’t have any questions, still reach out to me to let me know what you think of it – as Ken Blenchard said: Feedback is the breakfast of champions. Also make sure to check out my blog, hope to see you there! About this book: Today’s world is all about information. Scientific research suggests we spend up to 12 hours per day with media, be it TV, radio, online or print. We are bombarded with information. The essential skill not only for success, but also for mere survival, then, is filtering information. Otherwise, the paradox of choice will paralyze us, and we will not only lose the ability to make good decisions, but also the ability to decide at all, which is often even more important. I can’t tell you how big a part of our lives the internet will go on to become in the future. All I know is: It’s already pretty big, and to be successful, you must know your way around in an online world. If being able to filter information is the key to success, then that makes googling the skill of the century – and this book will help you master it. Whether you are starting out and just installed your browser, or a pro Google user already, I promise you will learn something from this guide. I have been told to be good at finding things on Google repeatedly, and I wrote this book to share this skill with you and do my best to teach it to others. It is meant to guide you. There is a short introduction, followed by a breakdown of what it takes to become a master user of Google. The process is detailed step by step, with tons of examples, so everyone can understand. The first step is for beginners. It explains how to come up with good keywords. If you are a newbie, definitely start here. If not, skim through this section, I’m sure you will still find some value in the framework I provided. The second step is for beginners and advanced users alike. It is a huge collection of Google shortcuts with hands on examples and clever ways how to use them. This is the biggest section of the book and not meant to read in order. I filed the shortcuts into 15 sections, which are: 1. Weather 2. Time and dates 3. Personal information 4. Media 5. Politics 6. Statistics 7. Food 8. History 9. Math 10. Travel 11. Language 12. Sports 2 13. Organizing 14. Biology 15. Random Tidbits Depending on how much you already know, skim through this section, look at the “what also works” sections at the end of each category, or just pick the categories not familiar to you. You can always come back to this section to look things up, or just learn something new each time you come back to the book. The third step is for advanced users. This means you should be familiar with all the concepts from step 1 and 2, in order to really get the best of it. Beginners can still profit from the introduction of the different Google platforms and search tools and then slowly make their way into advanced search operators. This is also a section that should not be read in order. I briefly outline the different Google platforms and search engines: Google Scholar Google Shopping Google Patents Google Images Then I show you how to use search tools, followed by the 18 advanced operators 1. The Dash 2. The Quote 3. The Underscore 4. The Asterisk 5. The Two Dots 6. The AND/OR operator 7. The AROUND operator 8. The site: operator 9. The link: operator 10. The related: operator 11. The cache: operator 12. The info: operator 13. The filetype: operator 14. The author: operator 15. The intitle: operator 16. The inurl: operator 17. The intext: operator 18. The inanchor: operator: Again: Go directly to the operators you need examples for or have trouble understanding, just skim through to get some new ideas or read in one go for the full truck load. I tried to sort them so they go from easy to difficult. Are you ready? Great! Now come on, I’ll teach you the skill of the century. 3 Disclaimer: The information contained in this guide is for informational purposes only. Google continually updates its search engine and adds and removes features. I will try to maintain this guide as best as possible, but I do not guarantee the accuracy of any of the information presented in the guide. As of 11-10-2014 all searches presented in the guide work. This is version 1.0 of the book. The material in this guide may include information, products or services by third parties. Third Party Materials comprise of the products and opinions expressed by their owners. As such, I do not assume responsibility or liability for any Third Party material or opinions. No part of this publication shall be reproduced, transmitted, or sold in whole or in part in any form, without the prior written consent of the author. All trademarks and registered trademarks appearing in this guide are the property of their respective owners. By reading this guide, you agree that I am not responsible for the success or failure of your decisions relating to any information presented in this guide. © 2014 Niklas Goeke 4 ‘There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact.’ – Sherlock Holmes A few weeks ago my Dad called me into his office. He said he had a computer-related problem. Now I know what you’re thinking: Haha, those Dad’s and their computer problems, right? You should know that my Dad is 49 years old and considered an absolute IT genius in his generation. He was around when Pong came out and his Dad’s architecture company bought one of the first available personal computers with a billing management software for their business. Price tag at the time: 20 grand (German Mark). He knows his way around ebay, email, excel, SAP, power point, and even some VBA. Sometimes though, like we all do, he can’t find the solution to a problem, because it is too simple to even consider. That day he told me that the links in his Thunderbird had stopped working. Before, when he had clicked on a link in an email, it would open in Firefox. Now when he clicked, nothing happened. “Can you fix this?”, he asked. “Sure.”, I said, opened Firefox, and by the time I had entered “thunderbird links”, Google’s auto-complete already offered the phrase “thunderbird links won’t open” - and my Dad moaned in the back: “Ugh, of course, I could have thought of this myself”. 2 minutes later his links worked again. It had simply been a matter of adjusting Thunderbird’s permissions as the standard email program. The obvious fact is that today you can google ANYTHING. Google is the most powerful tool the internet has to offer, and by using it correctly you can not only thrive and excel in business, but also in life. Not to mention the precious air you save by not having to ask 90% of the questions that pop up inside your brain every day. 5 I know, it’s more comfortable to just ask them anyway or have someone else just give you the solution or google it for you, but comfort is not what we are here for, is it? Any problem you have, or any information you are looking for, Google either has the answer to it, or can at least point you towards the source that has it. All you have to do is remember the obvious fact. You can google ANYTHING. And while I can’t help you with remembering to use Google - that you will have to do yourself – I can help you with perfecting the way you use it. Let’s get started by looking at searching itself. A search for an information is a process. As with every process, you have one or several inputs and a desired output. For the case of Google search there are two inputs: Your input (you must know what you are looking for and how to enter it into google) and Google’s input (index of the web with an automated search algorithm and built-in functions that increase the efficiency of your search). Your desired output: An information, whether it be in the form of text, audio, video or an image. Now, what all of us want to do is increase the quality of the output, namely we all want to (ideally always) find what we are looking for when we google. But how do you do that? The answer is simple: Increase the quality of the input factors. Today I will teach you how to tremendously increase the quality of the two Google inputs.