Here are some search tips to help you get better search results when using either basic (standard) search or Advanced search. You'll also learn about what you don't have to worry about in queries, and learn more about those keywords you may have noticed in some KnowledgeBase articles.

Using basic search

Following a few simple guidelines will help you get the best search results for your queries (the words you enter in the Search field):

• Start small. Start with 2-3 main words and see what kind of search results you get. Too many words—like the full title of an article—will return way too many search results. Pick the main words about what you need to find. It's easy to add a word or two and try again.
• Be specific. Make your search queries as specific as possible. For example, if you're looking for a KB about about error code -6183, enter "-6183" instead of "error" in the Search field.
• Try different words. Although we've entered many of the most common synonyms, you may want to try a slightly different word in your query. For example, if you first entered "determine," try entering "identify" and see if your results are better.
• Check your spelling. A misspelled word can affect search results.
• Select the right product and version. Some articles only apply to a specific product or version.
• Consider changing the search resource. The default search is KnowledgeBase articles. You can also search content in In-product Help and Community, and Center, as well as use Advanced Search. To use Advanced search, click the down arrow next to the Search button and select the resource to use.
  • All Results: Search all resources (returns the most search results but you may have to sift through a long list).
  • KnowledgeBase (default): Troubleshooting and informational articles. This is where you'll probably find most of your answers. 
  • Communities: Questions and answers by other QuickBooks users. 
  • In-product Help: How-to topics about using your product.
  • Advanced Search: Allows you to select a combination of resources, change the number of results shown per page, and search through archived KnowledgeBase articles.
• Know the KnowledgeBase ID? If you know the number of a KnowledgeBase article, you can enter it in the Search field. However, sometimes articles are archived or IDs are changed, so if the KB you want doesn't show up in your search results list, try another search—you may well find a different article that answers your question. Or you can search archived KnowledgeBase articles.
• Search suggestions. Take a look at the suggestions that appear as you enter your query. One may just suit your need.
• Avoid punctuation marks and special characters. Some punctuation marks and special characters (like commas, equal signs, hyphens, parentheses, and question marks) are fine, but many special characters aren't. In general, avoid any special characters and be careful about punctuation marks in your queries. They're not needed for the search anyway, so you might as well leave them off.

Things you don't have to worry about

• Case sensitivity. No need to worry about whether a letter has to be capitalized: You can enter "quickbooks" or "Quickbooks," or "QuickBooks" and get the same search results. Our search engine does the work for you.
• Stop words (like a, an, of, the) are such common words that our search engine doesn't even consider them. This means you don't have to waste time entering them in your queries.
• Word variants ("stemming") are built in to our search engine. This means you only have to enter "install" in your query to get articles that contain installs, installing, installation, and installed, as well as install.

Using Advanced search

In addition to all of the basic search capabilities listed above, you can use these:

• To open Advanced Search on the Support Web site, click the down arrow next to the Search button and then click Advanced Search.
• Customize the type of content you want to find. You can pick and choose which resources you want returned in your search query, both current articles and archived KnowledgeBase articles.
  • KnowledgeBase (default): Troubleshooting and informational articles. This is where you'll probably find most of your answers. 
  • In-product Help: How-to topics about using the product.
  • Customer Service: KnowledgeBase articles that are specific to Customer Service issues.
  • Archived: KnowledgeBase articles that are specific to products released in 2006 and earlier, or that we have identified as low-usage KnowledgeBase articles
• Change the number of search results that are returned (50 (default), 25, or 75).
• Search tips. Click Search Tips to reread these tips. You can limit the list of search results to the ones you want to look at.

Wondering about keywords? 

• Finding the keywords other customers thought were most relevant to the KB: The keywords that may appear in a KnowledgeBase article are words other customers entered based on what they thought the KB was about. Keywords are in rank order, so the keywords that have received the most votes appear at the top of the list.
• Voting on keywords: You can vote a keyword up or down in the list by clicking the + button to the right of the keyword or the – button to the left of the keyword.
• Entering a new keyword: If the word you think the article about isn't in the list, you can add a new one. To do so, click in the Add a new keyword field, enter your keyword, and then click Add. The new keyword appears at the bottom of the list.
• Viewing other aticles that have been tagged with the same keyword: Click right on the keyword to open a results page of other articles tagged with the same keyword. This is not the same as searching with a query, but it does give you some idea what other KBs might be about the same keyword. Bear in mind that not every keyword may have been tagged in a different KB. You can also see the whole keyword, if it's longer than the area that shows in the list, by hovering over the keyword.