MSN newest algo change...

[DMC_34]

I realize MSN changes its algo about 2-3 times a week but this latest change seems to favor a mass amount of links to your home page. It also now seems as long as you have a ton of link on page content means less. Father's Day gift basket pages showing up for "Spa Gift Baskets".

Obviously MSN thinks they are Google basing all their results on links. Only one problem...

Thye have absolutely no clue how to filter SPAM.

Hidden Text,
Purchased Irrelevant Link Packages.

Google is leaps and bounds better than MSN.

And no I dont rank on Google, sandboxed but personally I would rather wait it out than quick fix by buying links just to get ranked in MSN or Yahoo. I was actually on the MSN bandwagon when they considered CONTENT + LINKS, but the SERP's now are very painful.


Google blows MSN away when it comes to relevancy

[RadarCat]

MSN has made some sort of change as it is finally pounding my site as hard as Yahoo.

Even the GoogleBot awoke from it's long slumber and is pounding my site almost as hard as Yahoo and MSN!

Micro$oft seems to be trying really hard to build a truly relevant search engine. I wish them well.

Best,
RadarCat, WebMaster
http://www.os2warplinks.com

[wrmineo]

Yes, I think MSN is trying hard to come into their own so to speak. For all practical purposes, they're very new to this, as their search engine was previously "fed" to them from others.

I think it will take them some time to work out the ins and outs of their intent, but will emerge as relevant, authentic and yes, respected, in the long run.

I'm not so naive to think they'll challenge the Big G anytime soon but I do predict they'll gain a larger market share than Yahoo in the next year, becoming a solid #2 versus a distant third.

[montytx]

Seems like a bit of a long shot. I think they are a long way off from Google. Of course I think Yahoo is also a long way off. They all have some major flaws and I can usually find 1-2 spammy sites in my area of insterest floating in the top 10 on all the SEs. I guess we will have to wait and see.

[brian.mark]

Originally Posted by DMC_34

... seems to favor a mass amount of links to your home page...

Thanks for that info. I changed my signature here and went from #8 to #1 for power tools on MSN with no other changes to our site or links.

Brian.

[wrmineo]

Google is considered the industry's benchmark, but they are not perfect either. I'm not saying that MSN will leap up anytime soon to be a real threat or challenge, but I think they're getting better with each day and lesson learned.

I have a lot of respect for Google, but I find it very "disheartening" when I can do a keyword search for some very competitive terms and phrase and find "Untitle Document"s in the top of some results.

"webhosting help" has over 18 million results in Google with a #26 listing as untitled. The same phrase in MSN only has 350K results to sift through with no untitled documents in the top 100 ...

Better than Google or not, MSN is making a good effort to drive results that are clean, worthy, and relevant.

[ADAM Web Design]

I don't necessarily see "spa gift baskets" as being irrelevant in a search for "Father's Day gift baskets." When I went to buy my girlfriend a spa gift certificate last Christmas (which she still hasn't even used yet...go figure), the spa place handed me this brochure with a list of all of the various services and things, and a lot of men's services were listed in there.

I asked about that, and it turns out a lot of guys go to spas these days. I didn't see any that day, and I personally was too creeped out by the place to ever want to spend more than the 5 minutes required to get the gift certificate, but I can understand why guys would want to go.

As far as what they're doing as an engine (both SERPs and "look and feel") is concered, I personally don't think it will work out the way Microsoft intends for it to.

For starters, the SERP pages resemble Google way too much, and I've never been an advocate of the "follow the leader" philosophy that seems to be prevalent in a lot of design these days.

Second, they openly publish the content of the keywords tag (or part of it) in some of the SERPs. That just looks spammy, even when it's legit.

As far as emphasis on IBLs is concerned, I don't think it's as major a factor in terms of sheer numbers as you seem to think. I was #1 on my key phrase (Toronto Web Design) for over 2 years, and I've recently slipped to #7 (cause for concern, but certainly not cause for panic). Of the six sites that moved past my own, only 2 have more IBLs. So that's not the factor.

Personally, I'm not reading too much into the algo changes for any search engine until they all settle down somewhat (in other words, they keep an algo for longer than Liz Taylor keeps a husband.) I'm guessing the MSN one will change repeatedly before this is all said and done.