Lets talk about Google Dorks…
I’ve used them to:
- Find lead lists of 15,000+ CEO’s (who knew there were so many!).
- Find confidential, proprietary information about how my competitors are running their business.
- Pick up new industries & verticals 10x faster than I would have otherwise.
- Find contact information for top influencers.
- Create lists of over 5,000 PR contacts.
- Build huge databases of SEO backlink providers.
- Find cold email & cold calling scripts used by the best people in the industry.
All for $0.
This guide covers all you need to know to use Google Dorks to leave your competitors in the dust.
It’ll only cost you… $599.
Just kidding. 😉
This post is split up into 2 parts:
- An introduction with a brief how-to.
- 29 examples of growth hacking with google dorks.
Lets start off simple:
An introduction to Google dorks
Before you can start using google dorks to scale, lets answer a question:
What’s a google dork?
A Google dork is a search string that uses Google’s custom search operators to filter down search results. When used creatively, these filters can return information that wasn’t meant to be found. Exploiting Google dorks is known as Google dorking or Google hacking.
You can search Google for strings that are optimized to return sensitive documents…
Like contact lists, potential leads & more.
A lot of these documents probably shouldn’t have been on Google.
Here’s how you can put google dorks together yourself:
How to filter your google searches with operators.
You can filter your search with Google Operators.
An operator is a short string that tells Google which results you want to remove…
And which you want to show more of.
Here’s a table that shows some of the most popular search operators. (See the full list here.)
| Search Operator | Description | Example |
| OR | A logical OR | tesla OR edison |
| “Search Term” | Search for an exact match | "tallest building" |
| – | Exclude words from your search | jaguar speed -car |
| + | Search for a synonym | +California |
| info: | Get details about a site | info:google.com |
| site: | Search within a specific website | site:youtube.com |
| filetype: | Target a specific extension | filetype:pdf |
| intitle: | Search for a phrase in the title | intitle: "tesla vs edison" |
Include these in your google searches to filter down the results you’ll get.
Read on and see 29 examples of Google dorks in action:
The big list of Google dorks.
These Google dorks search for CSV, XLS and XLSX files that contain email addresses in them. This is perfect for finding contacts that you should reach out to.
| Goal | Query |
| Find CEO contact lists |
+CEO "email" filetype:csv | filetype:xls | filetype:xlsx |
| Find blogger contact lists |
"blogger" "email" filetype:csv OR filetype:xls OR filetype:xlsx |
| Find backlink sources |
"dofollow" OR "nofollow" OR "backlink" "contact" OR "email" filetype:csv OR filetype:xls OR filetype:xlsx |
| Find Marketing contact lists |
filetype:csv OR filetype:xls OR filetype:xlsx "Marketing" "email" "contact" OR "lead" OR "prospect" -sample 2017 "website" -template |
These Google dorks search for Request For Proposals across different verticals. These are great for finding opportunities to apply for RFP’s you might not have known about otherwise.
| Goal | Query |
| Find SEO RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “SEO” | "search engine optimization" -template -sample 2017 |
| Find PPC RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “PPC” | "PAY PER CLICK" OR "Facebook Ad" -template -sample 2017 |
| Find web design RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “web design” | "website design" | "website development" -template -sample 2017 |
| Find Accounting RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “accounting” -template -sample 2017 |
| Find Legal Service RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “legal” -template -sample 2017 |
| Find Business Service RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “management” -template -sample 2017 |
| Find PR RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” | "RFP" filetype:doc | filetype:pdf | filetype:docx “PR” | "public relations" -template -sample 2017 |
| Find writing RFP’s |
“Request for proposal” OR "RFP" filetype:doc OR filetype:pdf OR filetype:docx “writing” -template -sample 2017 |
These Google dorks search for marketing proposals across verticals. This is useful to learn about your competitors and see what top-tier marketing proposals look like.
| Goal | Query |
| Find social media proposals |
intitle:proposal "confidential" | "proprietary" | "do not distribute" filetype:ppt | filetype:pptx | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:docx “social media management” | “facebook management” | "social media" | "SMM"-example -sample -request |
| Find PPC Proposals |
intitle:proposal "confidential" | "proprietary" | "do not distribute" "PPC" filetype:ppt | filetype:pptx | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:docx -example -sample -request |
| Find SEO Proposals |
intitle:proposal "confidential" | "proprietary" | "do not distribute" "SEO" filetype:ppt | filetype:pptx | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:docx -example -sample -request |
| Find Web Design Proposals |
intitle:proposal "web design" | "web development" filetype:ppt | filetype:pptx | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:docx -example -sample -request -school -student -students |
| Find PR Proposals |
intitle:proposal "confidential" | "proprietary" | "do not distribute" "PR" | "press relations" filetype:ppt | filetype:pptx | filetype:pdf | filetype:doc | filetype:docx -example -sample -request |
These are miscellaneous google dorks that can help with improving your marketing & business processes.
| Goal | Query |
| Find marketing playbooks |
intitle:playbook filetype:pdf | filetype:ppt | filetype:pptx | filetype:doc | filetype: docx marketing |
| Find cold calling scripts |
intitle:script "cold calling" filetype:doc | filetype:docx |
| Find email marketing templates |
intitle:template "marketing" "email" filetype:doc | filetype:docx |
| Find work email addresses |
filetype:csv OR filetype:xls OR filetype:xlsx "email" "@" "First Name" "Last Name" "Company" -sample 2017 "website" -template "contacts" |
| Find work phone numbers |
filetype:csv OR filetype:xls OR filetype:xlsx "phone" "First Name" "Last Name" "Company" -sample 2017 "website" -template "contacts" |
| Find LinkedIn profiles of influencers in growth |
site:linkedin.com/in/ "growth" |
| Find LinkedIn profiles of influencers in marketing |
site:linkedin.com/in/ "marketing" |
| Find LinkedIn profiles of influencers in social media |
site:linkedin.com/in/ "social media" |
| Find Calendly links of marketers. |
site:calendly.com "marketing" | "growth" | "PPC" | "SEO" | "Social" | "Consult" -blog |
| Find freelance contracts |
intitle:contract filetype:doc | filetype:docx “freelance” -sample |
| Find agency contracts |
intitle:contract filetype:doc | filetype:docx | filetype:pdf -sample "marketing agency" |
In this post you’ve seen:
- What a Google dork is and how to put them together yourself.
- How to grab lead lists that other people have put together.
- How to find potential clients through RFP’s.
- How to find proposals and other sensitive documents of competitors.
- How to use Google dorks to find leads, top influencers, marketing playbooks & more.
Hope it was helpful!
Now you’re ready to start integrating Google dorks into your prospecting process.