Advanced Searching with Google
Google offers a number of ways to enhance your search by adding special query words, called advanced operators, to your search query. Advanced operators modify the search or tell Google to do a totally different type of search. Two advanced operators that are worth checking out are [link:] and [cache:]. Placing [link:] in front of a webpage url in the search box will tell you the number of webpages that have links to the specified page. For example, here are the results from the search query: [link:www.room214.com]
As you can see, Google has indexed 49 pages with links to the Room 214 homepage. This is a great way to gauge ongoing SEO, SMO (Social Media Optimization) and link building efforts. However, this is only showing the number of incoming links indexed by Google so you will want to consult other search engines for the most accurate number.
Another interesting alternate query type is the [cache:] query. Using this query will show the version of the webpage that Google has saved in its cache. You will also see the cache crawl date, which gives you the last date the Googlebot has crawled your site and indexed your latest content. Even if a webpage has not changed, Google will still show you the date that it checked your page for new content. Here is what the [cache:www.room214.com] results look like:
This can be handy when a website is lost due to computer failure, or if a co-worker happens to overwrite recent updates you made to a website. More details can be found on the Google Webmaster Central Blog.
If you want to get really fancy, check out all of the alternate query types in theGoogle Help Center.
BrandonSings:
Room_214:
Hello_BenHere:
MattAt214:
jo_rogel:
runquatro:
ElyseHeslin:
JamesOClark:
JasonCormier:
peterahall: