Search engines are essentially the same in the sense that they are useful for finding all types of information on about anything you can imagine. The difference between them, however, is what they can do for specific searches, and what information they pull up. They can all do the same searches, but some give you different page results for your endeavor. If you are looking for the number of an old friend, you should always give Ask.com a try.

The first obvious search would be to put the name in the general search box to see what comes up. Ask is pretty good about giving you the most relevant results out there. If the person you seek has a common name, or has a name associated with someone famous, you may find that you are overwhelmed with the results. Someone with an uncommon name is going to be easier to find through this simple searching method.

To narrow down your results, you can try the advanced search. You can open it by clicking on advanced search under the original search box. If you can fill in any of the information they ask for, Ask can narrow your results a bit. Beware, however, if you have the information wrong, it might tell you nothing is out there. Be sure of any data you add, or don't add it at all.

There are two ways that you can narrow your results to show hits that have the first and last name together in the text. You can put quotes around the name in question, or you can put a plus sign in between the first and last name. On Ask, the plus sign is actually the best way to go about this, as the quotes don't necessarily narrow things down as well as the other option.

Sometimes, Ask is all you need to find the number of an old friend, but at times, nothing will come up. You may not have thought of it, but you may have a number for that friend in an old address book. That number may not be valid any longer, but it just may be a number that person still uses. You can verify that information by going to a site that allows you to search a phone number.