MSN acting Crazy

[jaydilla]

Maybe you guys can help me out here. I was ranking at #5 for my site http://www.myhivstory.com for my keyword which is obviously hiv. After the new algo this is where it gets wierd. Well after the new algo my site will not appear in the top 250 during the day, but at around 7pm it shows up on page 2. Anyone have this happen? This is a everyday thing now.

[DMC_34]

MSN is changing their algo it seems daily right now. My positions fluctuate every couple of days.

One tip is you might have the same page listed twice as MSN has a serious bug with this right now. If so the one you will end up keeping is the one which shows a cached snapshot once they cycle through the index.

DMC

[dburdon]

The backlinks to my main site are all over the place. About last Wendnesday Yahoo and MSN were givign similar readings of 1,000 inbound links. By Friday the MSN IBLs had fallen to 150 and this morning 55!!

[dburdon]

My backlinks are now up to 3,500. They're a trifle volatile.

[freehits]

MSN has a search engine now?

Cant remeber the last time I checked there :-)

Real cool commercials though for that 3 week stretch.

[greeneagle]

Mine are doing the same.
Three days ago 1006
Last 2 days 36
Today 857
Ken

[netmar]

I have a keyword ranking #12 one day, then it disappears the following day to come back at #12 again 2 days later. Kinda strange since other keywords are more stable. Is this a bug?

[brian.mark]

Originally Posted by netmar

I have a keyword ranking #12 one day, then it disappears the following day to come back at #12 again 2 days later. Kinda strange since other keywords are more stable. Is this a bug?

As this is a Microsoft product, it is not a bug but rather a feature.

Brian.

[shimmer]

does anybody know which one is the best submission software to submit my web site to search engines?

thanks

[brian.mark]

Originally Posted by shimmer

does anybody know which one is the best submission software to submit my web site to search engines?

thanks

Yes. Links. Submitting software is a waste of cash. Just get some links to your site and they'll find it naturally.

Brian.

[Cantaleta]

I was #3 then #5 and now I jsut checked and I'm #12!!

What is going on with MSN? Can we do something to improve my ranking or leave it alone and just get more backlinks?

[brian.mark]

Originally Posted by Cantaleta

I was #3 then #5 and now I jsut checked and I'm #12!!

What is going on with MSN? Can we do something to improve my ranking or leave it alone and just get more backlinks?

There may be a lot you can do. Links will most certainly help, but there is more to MSN than links for sure. On-page stuff seems to help a lot (headings, titles, keyword focused text). If you've got that perfected already, then you could always try more links. Oh, and did I mention that links are good?

Really, MSN doesn't seem to care where the links are from right now. Just adding targeted anchor text in the signature for this forum gave us a huge boost. They also seem to favor pages that have updated content on a regular basis, so some simple text changes could put you up there for a while again. If you time it right, you don't fall out too often.

Brian.

[DEone]

yeah, MSN is nuts!

my site was the 3rd listing for my keyword term...

then it totally disappeared from the rankings

then it moved back up into the 2nd listing position for the keyword term

now it's gone again.

this is all within a month.

and i checked today and while the rest of my site shows up in searches, the page that was ranked #3, then #2 isn't even indexed right now... if i search on the url it doesnt find it

i definitely havent been penalized by MSN for anything. i have plenty other pages that are highly ranked still...

i guess ill just wait a week or two and then my site will be ranked #1 for that keyword term.

or should i submit my site again to get it re-indexed?

[adacprogramming]

An easy way to get links that at least MSN is happy with is adding to directories. There's a ton of them that you can find on this thread. http://www.webproworld.com/viewtopic...asc&&start=200

[adacprogramming]

Originally Posted by ccrooke

yeah, MSN is nuts!


or should i submit my site again to get it re-indexed?

Submitting your site doesn't do much, (or anything). The more links you have the more often msn is reminded to come visit.

You might want to check for broken links, or some other reason why your page got cut. Doesn't hurt to make sure your code doesn't have a serious problem. You can check for validation at http://validator.w3.org/

[khurramali]

Re-submitting will not help.

Try to get links from good sites.

Put some original / good content on your website and change it frequently.

if nothing else works, Wait the weather out.

[DEone]

Just as I suspected, my page has once again moved up to the first page of listings on MSN... currently listing #6...

If things follow the previous pattern, I expect to jump up to #1 or #2 in the next few days...

And then, I'll drop off again... the page won't even be indexed

I'm really starting to see a weird pattern with it. I have no clue what is causing it but I'll keep taking notes and let you know if I find anything interesting or useful

Chris

[matty21]

I think the best idea is to give it a few days to calm down and then reassess the situation and propose a fix. Until its finish bouncing around i dont see what else would help

[DEone]

yeah, I'm definitely not messing around with my pages every time they fall off the rankings. I'm just keeping a close watch on MSN to see if I can see a pattern to it...

I'm hoping it will stop bouncing around soon... It's been going for well over a month now and it's driving me crazy

[melaniejk]

Hi.
I saw a big drop in my rankings on MSN.
I was on page 1 of the results for my main keyword for years. This year my site was ranked #1 for that keyword. Now, my site appears on page 5.

All the rankings for all my keywords on MSN have dropped a lot.

Anything, I should do to fix this? Or, should I wait and see. It's been awhile now and I don't see it getting better. I doubt MSN will go back to the way it was.

Sigh. I had more traffic from MSN than from Google because of that #1 ranking.

I need traffic.

[brian.mark]

Originally Posted by melaniejk

Hi.
I saw a big drop in my rankings on MSN.
I was on page 1 of the results for my main keyword for years. This year my site was ranked #1 for that keyword. Now, my site appears on page 5.

All the rankings for all my keywords on MSN have dropped a lot.

Anything, I should do to fix this? Or, should I wait and see. It's been awhile now and I don't see it getting better. I doubt MSN will go back to the way it was.

Sigh. I had more traffic from MSN than from Google because of that #1 ranking.

I need traffic.

When talking MSN, 2 years ago was Google results, last year was Yahoo results, and this year it is their own algo. There isn't much history to base anything off of in MSN right now.

That said, best thing I've been able to do is make posts here and on other forums with my keywords in the signature as a link to my site. They're not all that sophisticated yet, but they'll eventually catch up. Until then, may as well keep on posting. ;-)

Brian.

[Ellio]

"and i checked today and while the rest of my site shows up in searches, the page that was ranked #3, then #2 isn't even indexed right now... if i search on the url it doesnt find it"

Same story here - we were No.1 yesterday for our major keyword and today the page is not even in the index although the rest of the site is!

It has been jumping from No.1-3 to knowhere for weeks now....

I have also notice an number of indexed URLs that are in the wrong format such as:

blabla.co.uk/test.html/homesupplies/index.html

even:

blabla.co.uk/test.html/homesupplies/homesupplies/index.html

What is going on!

[taxivantha]

As far as I can see, this bouncing can be a good strategy. Think of it as: there are a lot of good sites out there with contents as good as yours. Now you have to make a ranking: which ones comes first. The relevancy of a site can be a good measure but relevancy is difficult to figure into an algorithm. I've heard pretty sophisticated theories for figuring relevancy, but the fact is that they are algorithms. Algorithms can never replace human editing, but sometimes they can be fairer than human editors.

But until the relevance algorithms are perfected to something that truly measures relevancy, some kind of randomisation will increase the number of pages with information available to users. But users will expect some consistency in their searches. If they repeat for some or other reason the search five minutes later, they expect the same site on page 2. And admit it: webmasters want consistency too.

So, the bouncing is the better option. You are on top for some time, then you move back, later you come on top again. And from personal experience, I agree with those people who say that constantly adding new contents is one of the ways to hit the top frequently in MSN.

The noteworthy thing is that I move up in the rankings after adding new pages for keywords that are not related to the contents added.

In other words, I write an article about George W Bush, I move upwards for a few key phrases like "Cambodian temples" or "Battambang". Might you wonder, Battambang is Cambodia's second largest city. I've hit #1's on MSN for "Phnom Penh" - which is the name of Cambodia's capital city, in case you didn't already know. And "Phnom Penh" is the only keyword that I find half a dozen times back in my log files - all from MSN searches.

Google and Yahoo have different algorithms and react differently on changing content. But MSN's algorithm fits very well with the purpose of my website and I received more visits from MSN queries than from Google ones.

From a webmaster's point of view, those pages that do well in searches are the ones you have to focus on. Phnom Penh is one of it, so I will have to re-write Phnom Penh.

So, as far as the bouncing is concerned, for me it's a feature, not a failing. For the user of the search engine, it is a way to increase the available information.

It means that MSN has found itself a niche in which to excel. Having recent information is an important factor in MSN's rankings. It is a search engine that favours sites with blogs, forums and news flashes.

The last six months, I've been trying to optimise my site for Google, only to get on top in MSN. Maybe Google is a wider used search engine than MSN, but the trend is currently that MSN directs more searches to my site than Google. Google tends to favour older information, "trusted information" over the more recent content.

My new strategy is: optimise for MSN and Google will follow. Optimisation for MSN is not that difficult: just write. Add contents. Google will probably have evaluated the page by the time it is ready to be archived.

For Google, ancienity seems to count as an important factor. MSN Search favours mobility. And yes, it seems to be a little mobile itself, bouncing you up and down and up again.