We hope you find our search tool easy to use. We've put together this page to provide some basic guidance on using the search tool, plus some hints and tips on how to make the most of the search tool and find what you want.
Search essentials
The search box is available on every page of our website above the left-hand menu.
Type keywords in the the search box and click Go.
The Search Results page displays all matching results in the centre of the page. The entire site is searched and results from all sections are displayed. By default, results are listed by relevancy though you can sort them in date order or alphabetically.
How to refine your search results
If your search returns too many results you can use the Refine your search options on the right side of the Search Results page. You can limit your search to specific sections of the website, geographical coverage, date, or as shown below, by subject:
Select a refinement to only show matching search results within that refinement. You can also remove any currently selected refinements:
Choosing the right search terms
Choosing the right search terms is key to finding the information that you need. By default, your search will return results containing all of the keywords you enter entered in the search box.
If you can't find the information you need, try broadening your search terms by using less specific keywords or using a synonym or alternate spelling. For example, if a search on e-commerce does not return the information you want, try e-business or ecommerce.
If you get too many results, try:
- Entering more specific keywords
- Excluding results using the Boolean NOT
- Use the refinement options in the search results
Searches aren't case-sensitive so a search for worcestershire unemployment will return the same results as Worcestershire unemployment, WORCESTERSHIRE UNEMPLOYMENT or even WoRceSterSHire UnEMPloYmEnT.
Phrase searching
If you're searching for an exact phrase, put quotation marks around the phrase. For example, "regional skills partnership".
Plurals
To save you having to search for both singular and plural versions of words, searches will check both the singular and its plural for most regular plurals. For example, a search on small business will return the same results as a search for small businesses.
Wildcards
Indictae a wildcard with an asterisk. For example, a search for stat* returns matching results with statistics, statistical, statisticians and state.
Boolean operators
By default, the search tool will look for results that include all search terms entered, i.e. there is an implicit AND between the terms.
If you want to find results that include either of two search terms, then you can use the Boolean OR operator or the | symbol between the two terms.
If you want to exclude certain words from your search results, you can use the Boolean NOT operator or a - immediately in front of the word to exclude it.
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Search keywords entered
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Expected results
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herefordshire worcestershire
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All results relating to both Herefordshire and Worcestershire.
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herefordshire AND worcestershire
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This is the same as entering herefordshire worcestershire and therefore returns all results relating to both Herefordshire and Worcestershire.
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herefordshire OR worcestershire
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All results relating to either Herefordshire or Worcestershire or both.
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herefordshire NOT worcestershire
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All results relating to Herefordshire, excluding those relating to Worcestershire.
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Subscribe to search results using RSS
As well as the standard RSS feeds on this site, such as events and publications, you can save your own search query as an RSS feed.
For example, say you want an RSS feed of any new items on this site containing the word Walsall.
- Do a search for the word Walsall:
- At the right-hand side of the search results page, there's a link to subscribe to a feed of the current search results:
- Here's a view of the feed in Google Reader:
