Search engine techniques are methods of constructing a search query that improves the quality and relevance of the results. While every database and search engine is slightly different, there are some common techniques that you can use no matter what type of information you’re looking for. These can help you find what you’re searching for faster and easier, saving you time and frustration in the long run.

A search engine is a software system that locates information on the World Wide Web in response to a search request submitted by a user. The information may be in the form of webpages, images, videos, articles or other types of data. Search engines mine information from the World Wide Web, as well as real-time information from databases and open directories. They also utilize automated spiders or crawlers to discover and retrieve information.

Once a search engine discovers a page, it crawls the web to find other pages that contain similar content and records their locations. It then adds the indexed pages to its database. Once the search engine has a comprehensive list of pages that match a search request, it then sorts and displays them according to their importance to the query. The importance of a page is determined by analyzing how it links to other pages on the Internet.

While nobody knows exactly how Google works, it is known that its search algorithms are based on various factors, including relevance and freshness. Other search engine algorithms take into account a user’s location, language, search history and other data. The quality of search engine results plays a major role in determining the market share of a search engine.

In order to improve a search engine’s performance, the algorithm takes into account how frequently a page uses the words in the query and where they are used within the page. It also considers the page’s content and the number of times it is linked to other websites. In addition, it is becoming more sophisticated in its attempts to discourage the practice of “keyword stuffing,” in which a page is overloaded with keywords to artificially raise its ranking.

Another common element is the way a search engine determines the topic of a page by examining the keywords that appear on it and the frequency and location of these keywords. It then compares these findings with the keywords that were entered in the search request and provides matching results to the query.

Another useful search engine technique is using the Boolean logic operators AND, OR and NOT. These are not only easy to learn, but they can greatly enhance the quality of your searches. By combining them in the right manner you can create powerful search strings that are likely to produce the exact information you’re looking for. It is also a good idea to learn the guidelines provided by a particular search engine in designing your queries. Gimmicks that less reputable SEO firms promote will work only for a short period of time before the engine’s developers catch on to them and change its programming.