The links we have collected on this page will be helpful for doing research on countless proposal topics. Generally, a proposal writer or manager's Web-searching is limited to typing a few key words into his/her regular browser. But searching should be more sophisticated than this; it should yield you enough information to make your sections convey that you really know what you're talking about, it should help you develop a winning solution, and it should give you new ideas for where you can look for even more information. For your convenience, we've listed several distinct search categories as well as a few of the most exemplary and most comprehensive websites for each.

Basic Search Engines - Leading search engines locate various sites and documents by quickly and accurately running searches through a huge database. You've heard of most of these sites because they yield the most, and sometimes the most helpful, results.

Google http://www.google.com

AllTheWeb http://www.alltheweb.com

AltaVista http://www.altavista.com

Ask Jeeves http://www.ask.com

Excite http://www.excite.com

Gigablast http://www.gigablast.com

MSN Search http://search.msn.com

Teoma http://www.teoma.com

WiseNut http://www.wisenut.com

Yahoo! http://www.yahoo.com

Web Directories - Directories allow you to browse lists of Web sites by clicking on general topics, such as Health or Education, and then successively narrowing your search by clicking on subtopics. In many cases, you can also run keyword searches even after you've significantly narrowed your scope.

About.com http://about.com

Google Directory http://www.google.com/dirhp

Hoppa http://hoppa.com

InfoMine http://infomine.ucr.edu

Internet Public Library http://www.ipl.org

Librarians' Index to the Internet http://lii.org

LookSmart http://search.looksmart.com

Open Directory Project http://dmoz.org

Web World http://www.webworldindex.com

Yahoo! Directory http://dir.yahoo.com

Deep Web Search Sites and Directories - A Deep Web search is one that scans for material not easily found or indexed comprehensively by the methods that leading search engines use. If a Google search is yielding incomplete results or otherwise not digging deep enough, you should try one or more of the following sites.

Academic Info http://www.academicinfo.net

Complete Planet http://aip.completeplanet.com

Direct Search http://www.freepint.com/gary/direct.htm

Invisible-web.net http://www.invisible-web.net

Profusion http://www.profusion.com

Turbo10.com http://turbo10.com

Meta Search Engines - Meta search sites allow you to conduct a search on several search engines or directories at the same time. After you enter your search, these sites will present you with the few best matches from multiple sites on a single page.

Dogpile http://www.dogpile.com

ixquick http://ixquick.com

Kartoo http://www.kartoo.com

Mamma http://www.mamma.com

Metacrawler http://www.metacrawler.com

ProFusion http://www.profusion.com

Search.com http://www.search.com

SurfWax http://www.surfwax.com

Vivisimo http://vivisimo.com

Government Documents Search Sites & Directories - These sites are extremely helpful for navigating through government documents and publications.

About.com's U.S. Government Information Directory http://usgovinfo.about.com

Canadian Government Search Engines http://canada.gc.ca/search-recherche/srcind-eng.html

FedStats http://www.fedstats.gov

FedWorld http://www.fedworld.gov

FirstGov http://www.firstgov.gov

Google UncleSam http://www.google.com/unclesam

Government Printing Office Access http://www.gpoaccess.gov

GovSpot.com http://www.govspot.com

SearchGov.com http://www.searchgov.com

State and Local Government Directory http://www.statelocalgov.net

Newsgroups, Email Lists, & Discussion Forums - Being able to search through these forums is valuable for proposal writers because they function as entire subject-specific communities for professional and expert insight into a particular subject or category of subjects.

Catalist http://www.lsoft.com/lists/listref.html

Forum Zilla http://www.forumzilla.com

Google Groups http://groups.google.com

Newzbot http://www.newzbot.com

Tile.net http://tile.net/lists/

Reference Search Sites - Reference search sites allow you to search for information that has been collected in encyclopedias, almanacs, atlases, dictionaries, and other reference resources. Some of them have full access to even the most recently published reference guides and materials.

Bartleby.com Reference http://www.bartleby.com/reference/

Encyclopedia.com http://www.encyclopedia.com

Encyclopedia Britannica Online http://www.britannica.com

Information Please http://www.infoplease.com

MSN Encarta http://encarta.msn.com

Wikipedia http://www.wikipedia.org

Online Library Catalogs - This is a list of library directories and catalogs with differing features for accessing millions of different book and periodical listings from around the world.

Karlsruhe Virtual Catalog http://www.ubka.uni-karlsruhe.de/hylib/en/kvk.html

LibDex http://www.libdex.com/

LibWeb http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/libweb/

Open Directory Library Listings http://dmoz.org/Reference/Libraries/

Yahoo's Library Directory http://dir.yahoo.com/Reference/Libraries/

News Search Sites - These sites will help you to search news reports for current as well as archived story material.

AltaVista News http://www.altavista.com/news/

AllTheWeb News http://www.alltheweb.com/?cat=news

Ask Jeeves News http://news.ask.com

Daypop http://www.daypop.com

Google News http://news.google.com

MSN Search http://search.msn.com

RocketInfo.com http://www.rocketnews.com

World News Network http://www.wn.com

Yahoo! News http://news.yahoo.com

Blogs - The blog is becoming an increasingly important (multi-)medium for first-hand accounts and personal perspectives on a variety of issues. Blog entries are usually more thorough than half-pages of text; many include links to more detailed sites, images, and even audio and video. These sites will help you navigate the blogosphere for topics that are important to you and your proposals.

Blogarama http://www.blogarama.com

Bloogz http://www.bloogz.com

Daypop http://www.daypop.com

Fagan Finder Blogs http://www.faganfinder.com/blogs/

Globe of Blogs http://www.globeofblogs.com

Google Blog Search http://google.com/blogsearch

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