why does reloading a search yields different results?

[dansroka]

I have noticed something odd about how my site gets listed in Google. When I do a keyword search (under which I should be listed), I have noticed that I seem to get one of two possible sets of search results. In one, my site is nowhere to be seen. In the other, my site is listed in the top 15. Nearly all other results stay exactly as they were.

(Search for "ketubah" and look for my site "Modern Ketubah".)

If I keep reloading that search, over and over, 29 out of 30 times I'll get the one set of search results that doesn't contain my site. But 1 time out of 30, there I am. What's curious is that only my site (and a few others) under this search seem to be effected -- most of the other sites are always in the results, in the same position.

Does anyone have any idea what is going on?

Thanks,
Dan

[cbp]

Your search was most likely being done at one of many different data centers that Google has - it takes a while to propagate new data to all the data centers.

CBP

[flood6]

The data that is fed into the SERPs comes from several different servers (or even clusters of servers) called datacenters. This is because of the hundreds of thousands of searches that occur at Google every minute; one computer could not provide the data fast enough.

So a minor change in Google SERPs might take several hours or days to be seen on all of the data centers; updating them all at the same time is just not practical. By then another change has no doubt taken place and is working its way though all the servers.

When you search at google you are automatically fed results from one of several datacenters. Hit refresh and a completely different machine supplies the results.

...reloading that search, over and over, 29 out of 30 times...

Is there a 12 step program for that?

[dansroka]

So a minor change in Google SERPs might take several hours or days to be seen on all of the data centers;

In the wise words of Homer Simpson, "DOH!". Of course, multiple servers, I should've know that -- thanks for reminding me. What is it about doing SEO that makes you lose grasp of the basics? Oh well.

Dan

[toddieg]

here is a good tool to check the data centers.

[toddieg]

here is a good tool to check the datacenters.

[andertoons]

I'm so glad you posted that! I've been looking for that link!

[megahertz28]

Yeah it is possible that you happened to do your search while data centers were in update, however with such a peculiar search phrase you should be #1 across the board if you even remotely know anything about what you are doing! ;) The #1 site for the phrase "Modern Ketubah" has 16 links & "Ketubah" has 151. Although google is a link whore there is no reason that you couldn't make a week of it & be on the first page for both phrases. However in my opinion your time would be better spent adding content / links & forgetting what the hell Google wants you to do today (to take a term from MS), for tommorow it could potentially unimportant to your success. Even though MSN is a small % of search, I make more money from their results than the 2 big guys!? I intend to further support this by courting Mamma, LookSmart, Jeeves & the other piss ants. If it works out as well as MSN has for me than Google & Yahoo can perpetually kiss it! Also Dan, you should fill out your profile for every forum you post to. It only takes a second & can add an inbound links to your sites if the page gets indexed. As far as moving results I see them move up and down as many as 20 positions day to day but have had no similar experience with doing 30 searches in a few minutes & have anything change. (just tried on 2 sites) Good luck to you bud, we are all in this together!! :)

[goodhelp]

Yes, I've experienced this phenomena myself. Then the bright bulb of "aha!" blinked on and the 100-thousand Google servers gave me a good reason for it.

Lots of great tools mentioned here that I've bookmarked. Hard to keep up with it all!

My estimate, is that after this last algo update, the big G is now:

• Deemphasizing less prominent words in Title
  Stressing inbound link (IBL) text
  Reemphasizing variety of IBL anchor phrases
  Probably increased importance of IBL themes
  Scoring IP address variety of IBLs

Looks like we've got our work cut out for us! Ahh, just as we get good at playing the game...they move the goal posts! As mentioned, MSN is a good alternative for excellent results. At least you don't have to pay to get in their Directory. --Greg

[TechEvangelist]

I'm seeing something a little different. Multiple datacenters are being rotated, but they are not synchronizing. I've been tracking six different datacenters that have randomly swapped in and out of the Phoenix area. For my most important search phrase, one of my sites is in the top 10 in three datacenters, in about position 50 in the fourth, in about position 350 in the fifth and nowhere to be found in the sixth. These positions have moved very little over the past week.

I think this may be the final results of the new Google algorithm and they are randomly swapping datacenters that are intentionally varying the results.