The email query results are best! No longer have you had to remember in which folder you stored email written to John in reference to Peter. By searching for Peter or John, you will find all relevant emails and related correspondence. You can read and answer to any of discovered email from thread. This really saves time when you need to follow up to a large numbers of emails each day.

There are two more text buttons next to search field. One is Desktop Preferences and other is Remove Items. Desktop preferences allow you to choose types of files you would like program to include in its index out of available ones. You can also point out not to index specific folders from your hard disk. If you share your PC with others, it’s a good idea to eliminate your private folders from Desktop index. You can also specify not to index certain websites from your cached web history as well. The Remove items button allow you to eliminate selected results from index.

The advance search option allows you to search by phrase by putting phrase within quotation marks, to eliminate a word from search by putting a minus sign in front of word, to search by file type, and to search within a web URL. A neat feature is to integrate your desktop search with your web search. This is very handy if you have already done an extensive search for some information and after a few days doing search for similar information once again. Privacy question

By default, Google Desktop Search collects a limited amount of non-personal information from your computer and sends it to Google. This includes summary information, such as number of searches you do and time it takes for you to see your results, etc. You can opt out of sending this information during installation process or from Desktop preferences later. According to Google Privacy Policy no personally identifying information, such as your name or address, will be sent to Google without your explicit prior permission.

What is missing?

I bemoan not having PDF files in search process as yet. I have dozens of e-books and PDF whitepapers residing in my PC, and I really would prefer to have them indexed. That way, I’d have been able to read materials, when I needed them most.

The other thing I want to see is clustered result of my query, which shows organized search results into meaningful hierarchical folders similar to way Vivisimo search engine works. This clustering is particularly helpful for desktop search, as this allows us to see other relevant documents connected to searched word.

Conclusion

Due to Google’s immense popularity as a search engine, it’s logical that most users will prefer Google’s desktop search program as oppose to other similar programs, such as Copernic and Hotbot. Finally you can search your very own computer with similar ease and preciseness as you have been searching Internet for quite some time.

Sure, when you're writing for a website, subject material is different, but question is still same. What does your reader want to know?

Obviously, answer to this question will be different for everyone, but there are some common questions you can ask yourself which might help you decide...

- Who is your audience? - What time of day are they most likely to be searching? - Are they searching from home or their workplace? - Are they business owner or do they have a boss looking over their shoulder? - Are they relaxed or in a hurry? - Are they spending their money or someone else's? - Are they looking for something which will make their job easier? - Or are they looking for something which will make their job possible? - Are they trying to solve a problem or avoid a problem? - Are they looking for a budget solution or a ‘best of breed' solution? - Are they looking for something with all bells and whistles or something which focuses on one thing only? - Are they looking to buy immediately (just as soon as they know they've found what they want)? - Are they comfortable with internet purchases? - Are they final decision maker or do they need to convince someone else as well? - How much do they know already about your subject material? - How much do they want to know?

Whether you do some real research or just make some educated guesses, it's important that you know your visitor very well. Then, and only then, can you help them. And only when you help them will you start to realize true sales potential of your website.

Happy writing!

Related Articles: - How to get your customers to trust your website - http://www.divinewrite.com/trust.htm - Web Copy - How Much is Enough? - http://www.divinewrite.com/webcopyenough.htm - Engage Your Customer - Write About Benefits - http://www.divinewrite.com/benefits.htm - Writing Benefit-Driven Web Copy - http://www.divinewrite.com/webbenefitwriting.htm

* Glenn Murray is an advertising copywriter and heads copywriting studio Divine Write. He can be contacted on Sydney +612 4334 6222 or at glenn@divinewrite.com. Visit http://www.divinewrite.com for further details or more FREE articles.