Is there any research going around on how internet users search? eg: with or without quotes. The keyword phrase I'm working on is "virtual office services" In Google, with the quotes it returns 185,000 results - without the quotes it's 186,000,000 ... a massive difference. Would love to get an insight into how the average internet user searches. I know the general population is more savvy in their searching, but I wonder if there's any reliable research going around.
I don't know of any researches like that but I know by my site stats that very unsignificant percentage uses quotes because average surfer is a person who doesn't know what are quotes used for in search engines.
I concur pozer. Average users do not search like webmasters in my estimation. They go for the general generic search rather than the specific.
Thanks Smyrl and pozer ... that's pretty much what I thought too - wouldn't life be just a little easier if the average user used quotes. All goole would have to do is for a week have a tip placed below their search box eg: "Did You Know ... that by using quotes ..." and so many would learn.
general people search for whatever they have seen, if they just see a product advertised on tv call my blue potatoes then they will be searching for my blue potatoes or if they are looking for help with there new lcd tv they will search for something like help, my company name lcd is broken
I never search using quotes and to honest with you never even heard of searching with quotes until I saw it posted on a forum. I don't think many people search that way.
People search without the qoutes... that was a simple reply... but if you sank good to keywords in qoutes then you might also... see that might ... i say might as if your competetior is not the authority(have been there for several years)... then you would also rank good for keywords without the quotes... Take care Manish