Students are supposed to be high-tech and know how to use technology, right? I just 
led a session for students on how to be a better online searcher and was surprised that they were surprised to find out how effective phrase searching is.
Most of them just plug several words into a search box. So to show them how effective phrase searching is, I had them pair up and put in two different searches.
I told them to pick a name or topic in the news. Each was to do a search for that name/topic but one was to make a phrase search, meaning to put it in quotes. For example:
- Oscar Pistorius versus “Oscar Pistorius”
- Russian meteor versus “Russian meteor”
“Wow,” said one. She got far fewer returns with the phrase search. And those returns are often quality returns.
This continues to be my No. 1 search strategy — put names or adjacent words into quotes and you’ll be a more effective searcher.