Have you ever been Googled? Whether you know it or not, you most likely have. When you Google someone, you search with Google to find out information about that person.
Create a Search Checklist
Before you Begin searching, you should create a list of everything you know about the person, such as the following:
Full name, including the middle name
Maiden name
Place of birth
Current residence or last known address
Place of work
Names of parents, siblings, children, and relatives
Current and past employers
Interests and hobbies
Awards and recognitions
High school and university attended
Note
Make sure you check the spelling of the person's name, place of work, residenceeverything you know about the person. If you spell the name wrong, it's unlikely you'll find the person.
Search by Name
The first step is the most obvioussearch for the person's name by typing it into the Google search box. Make sure that you put quotations marks around the name before you press Enter, like this: "Tim Smith". If you don't use quotation marks, you might find odd results, such as towns or cities, landmarks, and so on.
Add More Search Terms
The odds are that your first search won't come up with information about the person for whom you're looking, unless you're searching for someone with a unique name. Instead, it will most likely come up with thousands of results, most of which are not useful. So now begin to add search terms, one by one. Use the search checklist you created in step 1. For example, try adding the person's last known address, university, personal interests, and so on. Make sure to use quotation marks when applicable, around the name of a university, for example. (When you're searching for an exact phrase, use quotation marks.)
Exclude Search Terms
If you're searching for someone who happens to have the same name as a person relatively well known or who has many Google results, you're going to run into trouble. It will be very hard to find the object of your search, and information about him might be buried several hundred or more results deep. To get around the problem, use the Advanced Search feature to exclude many of the search results of the more well-known person. (You can also use search operators to exclude search terms. For details, see
About Google Search Operators.
Get to the Advanced Search page by clicking Advanced Search next to the Google search box. (For more information about Advanced Search, see
Perform an Advanced Google Search.) Then in the without the words box, type any words that describe the well-known personfor example, "city councilor" or musician. Make sure that the with all of the words box includes the person's name and any other search terms you've added. When you're done, click Search.
Visit Applicable Pages
Using multiple search terms should bring you relevant results. Visit them, one by one. What you find on one page might also give you ideas for more search terms to use to fine-tune your search; use those terms for subsequent searches.
Search Through Blogs
A surprising number of people have their own blogs these days, so don't be surprised if who you're looking for has one. If he does, a blog is the best way to find someone or find information about that person because blogs are often very personal.
To search through blogs, go to the Google Blog Search at http://blogsearch.google.com. For more details, see
Search Through Blogs with Google.