I was wondering if anybody else has seen that their SERP are not usually accurate to what the webmaster tools say they are? Is this due to different search results in different locations or what? I do understand that it is often updated a day behind but still?
Yes you are correct most of the SERP tools shows different ranks for the keywords. I believe that they do search real time and return results, however they way it does is different. For example I am using a SERP checker "Rank Checker" from Seobook.com. The SERP results shown by this tool is equivalent to the Google search made with the search preference set to "100 results per page". Just try this!!!
Yes... location, Domains and as well as different searches EG: image search, Mobile devices, Web search. The default gives "All Searches" "From all Google domains" To find out what type of search you rank for and what Google domains you rank on, you need to use the drop down menus to refine the results. Cheers James