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How To Search a Website Using Google Site Search Shortcuts
Google Site Search allows you to save time by creating shortcuts to search a specific website directly within the Google search bar. To do this, there’s some configuration that needs to be done first in Google settings. Once the URL search parameter is set, you can apply this search feature to most websites.
Step-by-step
- Open Google Chrome browser
- Click on the vertical ellipsis (three dots) on top right corner of browser window to access Settings
- Click on Settings > Search engine (left menu bar) > Manage search engines and site search (center of webpage)
- Scroll down webpage to "Site search" and click the blue "Add" button
- Enter a website Name (ex. WesternU), Shortcut code of your choice (ex. WU), and the website URL in the fields shown.
Be sure to include "%s" at the end of the URL to enable your keyword search. *Refer to table below for some common shortcuts specific to WesternU.- Click "Add" to save.
- You can continue to customize your site search shortcuts by adding new search codes for additional websites of your choice. *See Additional Information section of KB below.
- To use a saved shortcut, enter the shortcut code (Ex. tdx) into the Google address bar and press tab. Type the search term (Ex. the TDX ticket number). Press Enter.
- To edit an existing shortcut, click on the pencil icon to the right of the shortcut name (Settings > Search engine > Site search)
- To deactivate or delete a shortcut, click on the "More actions" vertical ellipsis option to the right of the edit button
*Commonly used shortcuts for WesternU:
Additional Information
- When creating a shortcut for other websites, go to the website and enter a search term. Once the website loads the search results, copy the URL in the address bar and replace the search term to the right of the = sign with "%s"
- Sample website search
- Edited URL from website for Google shortcut
Note: Occasionally a website search URL may change. If a shortcut that you previously created stops working, try searching the website directly again and copy/paste the new URL to your Google site search settings with "%s" in place of the search term.