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I hope you're sitting down for this one. Here's one of the biggest secrets about the Internet! No, it doesn't directly make you money, and no, it won't immediately improve your personal life, but boy, will it make your Internet searching 10 times easier once you internalize it!!
Ready? Here we go:
Before You Begin - What Really IS A Search Engine?
Right? (Oh okay, you'll probably be presented with targeted ads or other search methods or Hollywood movie reviews or something similar as well, but that's not me point).
Look at that first paragraph text - "...the database index is searched..."
Searched! Searched, I say! It's a search! Just like every other search link you'll find on just about every other website that includes such a service!
You must have seen search links on other sites. Amazon, eBay, The Discovery Channel, etc. When you search at their sites, you're doing the same thing you do at the big huge search engines! The only difference is the other site's search index is
- Really tiny compared to traditional search engines
- Has only the documents from that site listed in their database
How can this help you online? It's time to dive into:
Step 1 - Revisit Your Searching
Let's say you've tried finding something in search engines and were dismayed by the results. You can ask yourself:
- Is my desire (ie search term) resident in the search engines...or is it something that's probably part of an inventory? - ie, perhaps
you want to find the exact sales
page for "toy trumpet" from which to buy. Certainly, some
Amazon.com or other sites might show up....but other toy
stores don't have their database indexed by search engines.
In that case, you'd want to use the store's search feature and
not the big boys. So instead of searching for
- "toy trumpet"
Instead you'd mentally move up one level. What kinds of places have toy trumpets? You could search for
- toy musical instruments instead.
- "toy trumpet"
- Do I want get educated reviews first? - let's
say that you want to find reviews of HDTVs. Instead of
searching for simply, HDTV, you could search for
And then use those forum search features to find reviews of the items in which you are interested.
Remember, you don't only have to search for item names! You can tack on the words
- forum
- message
- discussion
- community
- etc.
to you searches, and then use that site's search function to zero in on your quarry.
It's an interesting concept, isn't it? There are millions of pages on the Internet that aren't indexed - database entries, product listings, etc. But once you know where to find these sites, the searching is generally free and you can pounce on your information!
How do you find these sites, I hear you ask? It's time to introduce:
Step 2 - The Invisible Web
What's the Invisible Web? The "visible web" are the things you can uncover easily. Search engine results, directory contents (places like Dmoz.org, etc.
The "invisible web" are the searchable databases like the ones I described up above. You access them by knowing the main search page of that database.
My colleague used to teach the Invisible web to recruiters several years ago. It's highly addictive.
Like the visible web, the Invisible web has sites that are dedicated towards providing jump-off points. The best I've found include:
These sites are great for discovering targeted, searchable databases directly. You can visit the search results and come up with information that might not be included via your traditional search engines.
Remember, the Internet is a collection of links! Your challenge as a savvy Internet surfer is to find pages that suggest themselves....ie, they'll help you track down your final quarry. For example, if you want to uncover, say, oracle resumes, you could look first for user groups or associations, and then for member's resumes. Or if you crave finding black trumpets, you could look first for trumpet forums and then see if there's a classified section as well.
It's certainly an adventure! Which brings me to:
Step 3 - For More Information
As always, an educated Internet user is the safest online! Check out:
- Berkeley's Invisible Web - excellent tutorial about the subject.
- Albany's Deep Web - another excellent tutorial about the 'deep web'.
- Brightplanet.com's White Paper - Comprehensive analysis of the Deep Web.
And of course, enjoy:
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