I was brainstorming for link bait ideas, and decided to try one out. I checked for a certain term, and took note of the top 10. This is a low compete/volume term, so all it took was a few strategic links to get it to number 1, 3 days later. So when I saw that we were number one, I then checked to see if this term had a term.com. I typed in term dot com from the search results page, and there was a mediocre PR 1 site with lots of textbook examples of bad SEO. The next day, all of a sudden term dot com was in the number 1 position. It was there for about 2 days, and then today it is no longer there. My site shows 1 across the board according to one of the multiple data center rank checkers. How/Why did that happen? Did Google track me typing in term dot com via the toolbar after my search? Was this the first link it found with this specifc anchor text in it, and then decided to see if a term dot com exisited? If that is so, did it get number 1 for that sole fact, and then Google realized that having term dot com was not enough for the number 1 considering all the blatantly bad seo factors? Thoughts, Ideas, Educated guesses are appreciated.
so whats your main question?! is it why your site disappeared on top1 position and then placed by the 'term.com'?
no. My site never disappeared. It just went to the number 2 spot. I'm wondering why out of the blue the term.com became #1 for a few days, and then disapperared.
flux Maybe it wasn't there before you started your search, and you just happen to hit it during a search algo flux. Drink less coffee, and back away from the conspiracy sites. hahahha
Conspiracy sites? I don't understand what you mean. I cleary stated that it wasn't there before I started optimizing for the term. I also don't drink coffee.
Yes ..the part about the Google Toolbar. Speculation... the toolbar could give you flavored results... using info you enter before...then... since you didn't enter it anymore... it figured you didn't like it. Now, let's imagine if there's no heaven.
it could also be that you had personalized search on....if you are signed into any of your google accounts, google tries to tailor results to your search history
I thought about this long and hard last night. It makes sense, but I am surprised it would affect all the DCs. The term dot com site has now come back to number 1, with my site at number 2. I get the same results checking from 3 different ISPs. Info pulled from one toolbar session shouldn't be able to make an impact like that so quickly, should it? SEORanter: I did not have personalized search results on. I only stay logged in when absolutely necessary. Google already knows everything about the site, I don't want it associating my search behavior with it as well. If I did have it on, would it really alter the organic #1 result because it thinks that is what I want? Seems that would negate the whole point of how organic search is ranked.
Yes, if the toolbar stored info in a cookie, or other file... closing a session wouldn't matter. Something simalar to this technology might be happening...Google Site Favoured Search https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?answer=35652 then again...maybe not. Things do change, even your #1 spot.
Hmm. That is very interesting. Thanks for sharing it. It would seem this technology could be developed to such a point that SEO would be almost useless. Results would be based on the search behavior of the individual. However, I believe that would be too dynamic, and could potentially have a lot of problems. I'm thinking I should get rid of the toolbar. Are there any 3rd party ones that don't require you submitting information to use it?