1.2 Create a search strategy to fully satisfy the client's enquiry

Table of Contents

1. Choosing search terms
2. Structuring an Internet search
   1. Search Engines
   2. Differences between search engines
   3. Compound queries
   4. How search engines work
   5. Metacrawlers
   6. Web directories
   7. Differences between directories and search engines
3. Using portals
4. Using bibliographic databases
5. Frequently-used websites
6. Website suffixes

Structuring an Internet search

As an information professional, you need to know all the shortcuts to information that client's request. This means more than just typing search terms into Google!

Structuring the search involves the choice of different search engines, metacrawlers, directories and portals or, where you are already familiar with appropriate websites and their content, direct interrogation of these.

In order to search effectively on the Internet, you need to be familiar with the different types of websites used to search for information. Three general types are the search engine, the metacrawler and the directory. Each operates and is used in a different way, although several sites incorporate more than one type. For example the Google site consists of both a search engine and a directory.

We'll begin by taking a closer look at Search engines ...