I *ain't* feeling lucky

February 28, 2006 8:30 AM

Help me increase my google-fu...

I want to be able to find a company's website, in this case Icon, the makers of motorcycle riding gear. When I search "Icon" "+Icon +gear," etc, the results are every-web-based store that carries their gear. But I want to go straight to the company's website. How can I have the search engine (I am not tied to google, just use it most often) return the results of the company that makes the product, not where the product is distributed? I tried url:icon but all the sales-related sites have icon somewhere in their product-specific urls. This is an ongoing problem that I would love to know the solution to...

Thanks.

posted by iurodivii to computers & internet (12 comments total)

How would google know which website actually makes the product and which websites are only distributing the product?
posted by null terminated at 8:34 AM on February 28, 2006

Sorry I can not put together a search string for you right now but this resource might be helpful while you wait for other answers:

Google Tips
posted by MLIS at 8:45 AM on February 28, 2006

I think you've just chosen one of those companies whose websites weren't designed to be found. As far as Google is concerned, their website is solely comprised of a nearly-empty page that admonishes you for not having Flash and Javascript turned on.

(That said, I find the Parts Canada Icon catalog a much better way to see what Icon has available than their own site. Unlike Parts Unlimited, the Canadian branch lets you view the catalogs online.)
posted by mendel at 8:46 AM on February 28, 2006

Interesting. Google just won't have anything to do with it (the website rideicon.com), but Yahoo! brings it up in the first five results. It is a truly terrible website, expect to wait for at least a minute while it loads itself up - perhaps Google is boycotting it - nice one.
posted by grahamwell at 9:03 AM on February 28, 2006

Yes, that is without a doubt one of the worst websites i've ever visited. In this case I will be searching through distributor's catalogs...

But still, is there a search command to pinpoint the target company's website and not just websites that deal that company's products? I know recently I have encountered this problem on more than one occassion.
MLIS the cheat sheet didn't seem to have what i am looking for. Maybe if there is a way to search for a term *before* the .net, .com etc ending, so that way it is limited?
posted by iurodivii at 9:14 AM on February 28, 2006

I don't have any suggestions for creating a better search, but I do have one for usability: I set Google to display 50 results per page, rather than the default 10. Even with a good search strategy, I often have to go beyond the first ten results to find what I'm looking for. But if what I'm looking for isn't in the first 50 results, it's time to give some more thought to my search strategy.

The search for icon motorcycle gear gives a page on the official site as the 27th result, although the page itself gives a 404 error, but you can truncate the URL to get up to the home page. Also, there's no indication in the Google results that that site is, in fact, the company's official site. In this particular case, I don't know that there's much that you could have done--Icon just hasn't made its site easily findable.

But still, is there a search command to pinpoint the target company's website and not just websites that deal that company's products?

Nope.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 9:18 AM on February 28, 2006

There always the old-fashioned Google Directory, which can help separate search results by category, but doesn't work for this example.
posted by Cuppatea at 9:21 AM on February 28, 2006

Try Ask.com
posted by JJ86 at 9:40 AM on February 28, 2006

Google seems to be so busy with everything else that they are losing touch with their basic search engine effectiveness. Ask.com seems to be pretty effective as well as Yahoo.
posted by JJ86 at 9:44 AM on February 28, 2006

I've had some success before with "official site", "official website" and the like, but in this case, no joy. I hope someone from the company reads this.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 2:45 PM on February 28, 2006

Searching del.icio.us for « icon motorcycle » brings up the site.
posted by Sharcho at 2:52 PM on February 28, 2006

Normally I'd try searching for key words which would be used on an official "About Us" page - stuff like "established since", or those suggested by AmbroseChapel.

None of that worked, so I checked out the site directly (the link above is b0rked)... the first thing it wanted to do is load Flash 8, which I can't do on my work computer. So no page loaded.
I suspect that this is the problem why Google has nothing indexed, although I'm not sure.

Looking at the source for the main page, I notice that the company is called "Icon Motosports" (not the usual spelling of "motorsports") - if you Google for this, then the site is the first one in the list...
posted by Chunder at 3:21 AM on March 1, 2006