Why Store Info When You Can Just Search For It?
from the organization-is-overrated dept
With plenty of companies trying to jump into the search space and take away Google's lead with something "different," it's interesting to note that many people may not realize how people really use search engines. WebProNews is highlighting a new study suggesting that many people use search engines as an alternative to filing away info. That is, they repeat queries all the time, just to find info that they had found before. In fact, 40% of all search queries are repeats. That's probably a lot more than most people imagined -- and it suggests that people are looking at search engines even more as a "second brain" to store info, rather than just as a way to find new information. Why bookmark something when it's probably easier and faster for Google to just find it for you again? Of course, such activities can be dangerous if the search results change, potentially "erasing" the link to a bit of information someone wanted. That's why it's also interesting to note that Google, at least, is now experimenting with a feature to let you store specific links in your own personalized Google results, guaranteeing that they'll be there the next time you search.
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Searches easier than a bookmark?
Unless you're mouse-phobic, isn't one or two clicks that take you right to a page a lot easier and faster than typing a keyword, scrolling a list, and clicking a link that may or may not still be there?
I would say that a lot of the 40% of users that repeat searches may be unaware of the bookmarking function.
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Re: Searches easier than a bookmark?
My expectation is that many of the repetitve searches are just that - get the latest and greatest -- not a replacement for static links.
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I run the same search multiple times for a number of different reasons.
First, as others have mentioned, sometimes you want to see if there are any new pages associated with the query. This particularly applies to very recent events where new information is coming up frequently. It also applies to some older topics that evolve over relatively long time periods of months or even years.
Second, there are some categories of stuff I search where if I bookmarked all the pages I would soon need a search function for my bookmarks. A good example of this is error messages/numbers generated by applications. In the course of a month I probably see 100+ error numbers that I need to investigate. Many of them are frequent repeats that you just plain remember after a while, but a good 50% or more are infrequently repeated with weeks or even months in between occurances.
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Desktop Search
I also use it to look-up contact info instead of opening up the Address Book in Outlook. Just type the person's name and it returns their contact info.
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Search or Store?
When I'm researching people/happenings, it's usually for a game, often I'll take information from the pages directly, something I think is what I want at the time, but usually I decide I want more or want other people to check over it, to see what their opinions are. I'm sure both of the methods I use when rerunning a search is the same for many people.
When I find a WEBSITE (not usually a certain page) that intrigues me, I will always bookmark it without hesitation for future reference. Having said that though, there are images and some pages that I have bookmarked, but I have no idea why...maybe I was just making my huge bookmark list, a lot bigger...
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