Google Doesn't See Its Own Indexed Pages - Puzzle

[freetraff]

SEO life is full of interesting things.

Today I decided to check an old article of mine that was submitted to EzineArticles over a year or even 2 years ago.

I type into Google the title of the article - everything is fine, Google has indexed the page. But then I copy (from the Google's results) the URL of this page, paste it into Google search - it does not see the page with that URL.

How come Google does not see the URL of the page that it has officially indexed and that can been in this index for at least over a year?

I understand if that might happen to some low trust web site, but this is about:

- a page from EzineArtciles - a very trusted site
- a page that has been in the Google index for years (and it is in the index, if I do a search by title of the article)
- a page that has many backlinks from other pages of EzineArticles (which means backlinks from quality pages)

What the heck? Why is Google showing "did not match any documents" when I type into its search the URL of the page that I took from its index?

[crankydave]

How about the URL...

Dave

[wige]

I think in general Google treats all search terms, including URLs, as keywords. There seems to be a difference if you enter a domain name, where Google will return the home page for the domain, but a full URL will only return pages that have that URL in the content of the page.

[freetraff]

Originally Posted by crankydave

How about the URL...

Dave

Sorry, I had to do it from the very beginning.

This is the URL of the article Biggest Debt Consolidation Mistakes - Helpful Advice

And if you type into Google the title of this article "Biggest Debt Consolidation Mistakes - Helpful Advice" you will see that Google indexed the page and even as the text link in green show this URL (without http://, but even without it Google shows nothing when you type it into the search field).

[crankydave]

Here...

ezinearticles.com/?Biggest-Debt-Consolidation-Mistakes---Helpful-Advice&id=542419 - Google Search

I suspect part of the problem is duplicated content on different URL's within the site...

"ezinearticles.com/?Biggest-Debt-Consolidation-Mistakes-Helpful-Advice&id=542419" - Google Search

Dave

[activeco]

Ampersand "&" and questions mark "?" are special character for Google. Even when url encoded it can produce unexpected results.
Try this search instead: ezinearticles.com/?Biggest-Debt-Consolidation-Mistakes---Helpful-Advice - Google Search

[eugie17]

this has no importance why you want the URL if the title is already found?

[emps]

Originally Posted by activeco

Ampersand "&" and questions mark "?" are special character for Google. Even when url encoded it can produce unexpected results.
Try this search instead: ezinearticles.com/?Biggest-Debt-Consolidation-Mistakes---Helpful-Advice - Google Search

Using dynamic url,s are not search engine friendly....thats the simple answer




<snip... Please add your link to your signature CD>

[markrchisholm]

Originally Posted by emps

Using dynamic url,s are not search engine friendly....thats the simple answer

Depending on what you mean by 'not search engine friendly'...

If you mean that dynamic URLs wont rank when Google is queried for a related phrase then what you have said is incorrect. It may have been true in the past but now is not (of course varying degrees of emphasis can be place on 'friendly'). The fact the article is listed in the top spot when you search for the title confirms that. Even if you widen the phrase out to 'Debt Consolidation Mistakes' a different article from the same website is listed at number 3 (with a dynamic URL).

However if mean, when a dynamic URL is entered into Google's search box then the page will not be listed, I suppose you are correct, but other than for the webmaster investigation's this would play no role in SEO.

[sofomor]

Hello,

The article ranking #1 is not yours actually. The title is different and the URL as well. Even if you click on it, will lead you to totally different article, not yours. If you copy past that URL into search box you will find it indexed.

Yours ain't indexed yet....

Thank you

[emps]

Originally Posted by markrchisholm

Depending on what you mean by 'not search engine friendly'...

If you mean that dynamic URLs wont rank when Google is queried for a related phrase then what you have said is incorrect. It may have been true in the past but now is not (of course varying degrees of emphasis can be place on 'friendly'). The fact the article is listed in the top spot when you search for the title confirms that. Even if you widen the phrase out to 'Debt Consolidation Mistakes' a different article from the same website is listed at number 3 (with a dynamic URL).

However if mean, when a dynamic URL is entered into Google's search box then the page will not be listed, I suppose you are correct, but other than for the webmaster investigation's this would play no role in SEO.

I was referring to the post by Freetraff who questions why, when searching for the page when clicking the dynamic url in the address bar on the the page is not found.

If search engine(ok google as an example) is queried for a related phrase (keyword/keyphrase) of course it will produce an indexed page. However searching for that same page using a dynamic url will generally not work as the spider will not go past the query string ?

There is a technique to convert dynamic urls to plain html, and other methods to hide dynamic characters.

I will say there are some exemptions to the rule,for instance there are dynamic urls listed in some google databases, but never ones with "complicated" query strings.

[freetraff]

Originally Posted by sofomor

Hello,

The article ranking #1 is not yours actually. The title is different and the URL as well. Even if you click on it, will lead you to totally different article, not yours. If you copy past that URL into search box you will find it indexed.

Yours ain't indexed yet....

Thank you

How come it's not mine. When I type into Google "Biggest Debt Consolidation Mistakes - Helpful Advice" this what I get as #1

Biggest Debt Consolidation Mistakes - Helpful Advice
Biggest Debt Consolidation Mistakes - Helpful Advice.
ezinearticles.com/?Biggest-Debt-Consolidation-Mistakes---Helpful-Advice&id=542419

... at least this is what shows from my IP and as far as i get from the answers of other WPW members they see my article there as well. I can even bring a screenshot - from this url you can download the screenshot in JPEG RapidShare: Easy Filehosting

Yes, in the additional results from the site it shows the page titled Reliable Debt Consolidation Advice, but that's another story. No one is talking about that page.

We are talking about my page which is shown the Google results as indexed and Google shows strange behavior on URL of this indexed page.

P.S. WPW members, thanks for sharing your feedback.

[markrchisholm]

Originally Posted by emps

I was referring to the post by Freetraff who questions why, when searching for the page when clicking the dynamic url in the address bar on the the page is not found.

If search engine(ok google as an example) is queried for a related phrase (keyword/keyphrase) of course it will produce an indexed page. However searching for that same page using a dynamic url will generally not work as the spider will not go past the query string ?

There is a technique to convert dynamic urls to plain html, and other methods to hide dynamic characters.

I will say there are some exemptions to the rule,for instance there are dynamic urls listed in some google databases, but never ones with "complicated" query strings.

Ok, I agree with what your saying but, apart from the fact that 'Using dynamic url,s are not search engine friendly' doesn't actually make sense, it could be misunderstood by somebody who doesn't know any better to mean something quite different. Maybe saying 'search engines do not handle queries containing special characters in very well' would have been a better way of putting it.

Sorry for being picky, but I'm sure a lot of newbies take everything that they 'think' they read on this forum as gospel.

[emps]

Originally Posted by markrchisholm

Ok, I agree with what your saying but, apart from the fact that 'Using dynamic url,s are not search engine friendly' doesn't actually make sense, it could be misunderstood by somebody who doesn't know any better to mean something quite different. Maybe saying 'search engines do not handle queries containing special characters in very well' would have been a better way of putting it.

Sorry for being picky, but I'm sure a lot of newbies take everything that they 'think' they read on this forum as gospel.

I disagree.

Consider this. If you insert a <a href to a url with ?"query string" into a pages source html the google spider will ignore it.

As i said if that url is converted for instance using the word dynamic instead of the ?( may also neccetate having to modify the ht acces file)

then google would follow. There proving the statement that url,s with ? and & are not search engine friendly. I cannot figure any other valid interpretation to offer a "newbie".