Hit a Brick Wall in Your Family History Research?

At some point all family history research leads to a 'dead end' where leads just seem to dry up and many of the posts on this site relate to finding 'missing links'. I've had some great success using the following technique and I hope it helps others.

Firstly, you need to understand how the internet works, or at least how the search engines work, e.g. Google, Yahoo, etc, etc. For the purposes of this example well focus on Google. It uses a system of keywords to match your query (the visitor) with web pages delivering that content (the providers). These keywords are the search terms you (and millions of others), type on the search bar. The results passed back are those pages, or providers, that meet the search term. As you can imagine, competition by the large commercial organisations to be returned in a good list position is fierce and so large amounts of marketing spends are focussed on ensuring high ranking within the search engines.

OK? So what does that mean for us? Last month, May 2006, approximately 152,000 people typed in a search for Genealogy. Ive just typed the same search into Google. 73.6 million web pages were returned in the results! Not surprisingly most of the top positions are taken by either the main database vendors or resellers (affiliates) of the major vendors.

Now the internet contains THOUSANDS of personal websites where researchers (just like you), publish their family tree hoping to make connections. The problem is they have almost no chance of reaching top positions on search results and so are difficult to find.

So how do we find them?

1. Be More (very) Specific

What were these people typing genealogy actually looking for? Genealogy Scotland, Genealogy book, genealogy Cowan? Who knows, but they were presented with was the main commercial vendors keen to get some subscriptions.

2. Combine keywords + phrases

Now lets try: genealogy scotland + smith (try it)

Were getting closer, about 872,000 results, quite a few but much more specific and beginning to return some interesting personal websites.

3. Search rules (syntax)

Did you notice the + sign in the example above? To the search engine this means and so, the results returned will contain; genealogy OR scotland AND smith.

Now try this: genealogy scotland + smith

Note: The quotes around "genealogy scotland"means to match the EXACT PHRASE and this is particularly useful when looking for specific individuals e.g. "John William Smith".

So the search above returned about 19000 results, much better, and some very specific sites containing personal family history pages.

As you can see the best search results come from being very specific. Of course you can vary these searches to include placenames, dates, etc, etc. The same rules apply to most of the major search engines. One last thing, most of the search engines include an 'Advanced' search button, this will further allow inclusion / exclusion of certain terms, dates, etc.

Bill Cowan

Let your ancestors find you! http://www.family-history-scotland.co.uk

Can Scrapbooks Be Used To Show a Companies History?
Over the last 20 years, Ive attended several company conventions. One thing Im always puzzled about is the lack of photos, lack of visual company history.Every company has a story to share. Every company has history. Every company should be keeping a scrapbook of this history.What should be included in these company scrapbooks? What about photos of...

LCD TV Wall Mount - 5 Things To Consider For Your LCD TV Wall Mount
LCD flat panel TVs have been flying off the shelves in recent months. If you have been one of the lucky ones to have purchased a new TV or if you plan on purchasing a new flat panel in the near future, you are no doubt considering mounting your flat screen on the wall. A properly mounted flat screen TV will not only provide optimum viewing for yo...

Shopping for a LCD TV Wall Mount
Are you scouring the web for a LCD TV wall mount that will allow you to mount your LCD TV from a wall instead of using a stand? Are you on a budget and looking for a decent LCD TV wall mount that is in your price range? The internet is a great place to start your search for a LCD TV wall mount. Here you can not only read reviews and get an idea ...

David v Goliath
I have been involved in Family history for about twenty years now, and have been on the family history circuit attending various fairs around the country for about twelve years.In my time on the circuit, I have met lots of stall holders, some are fly by nights who think you can shove anything onto a CD, flog it, make a pile of cash and then disappe...

Shopping For Affordable Home Insurance - Savings Tips And Precautions That Will Help
Are you shopping for affordable home insurance? If you are then you need a lot of savings tips to help you save as much as possible. However, you also need to take certain precautions in order to ensure that you do NOT fall into the right hands while looking for the best deals. Let's take a deeper looking into these...1. You'll enjoy cheaper rates ...

Avail A Poor Credit Unsecured Personal Loan: Leave Your Bad Credit History Behind
A poor credit unsecured personal loan brings hope for a tenant with a bad credit history. Earlier bad credit was not considered good among lenders, but now they are easily offering loans to people with bad credit history. We all face some dire situations in our lives where we all look for some easier options and to avoid any financial crunch, we go...

Family Tree Dealing With Conflicting Facts
I have been researching my family tree for several decades and a few days ago I received a recently published book that contained a photograph of a granduncle and his family. The caption recorded his wifes name as Mary Brown. However, my records show that her name was Eliza Smith. How do I uncover the truth? Perhaps you have run into a similar prob...