AltaVista - on the road to recovery?

Anyone notice nearly instance free inclusion and relevant serps?

[Beezer]

I've completed a few new websites over the last 3 weeks. All three sites have appeared in AV serps using relevant kw searches within days! Didn't pay for inclusion....Have also noticed a few more referrals from AV over the last month.. Not a lot, but more! Anyone else have similar experiences?

[mack]

I think av's serps have improved but I don't like having to scroll out of sight to get to the first result.

[brotherhood of LAN]

Definetely Beezer. There was a thread about a month ago highlighting that AV had updated, and since then, it has sneaked above Lycos in my referrals below MSN google and yahoo. I'm not complaining at all. :)

[Marcia]

I've got a page that was last updated on May 15th, and they're showing it last updated Feb. 28th. But at least they're there.

It looks to me like a complete change.

[RBuzz]

I've got a soft spot in my heart for AltaVista, since there are certain ways they're still more flexible than Google (can do link: searching in conjunction with date-based searching, there's no query word limit, etc.) I'm thrilled that they're coming back to life. I just hope it isn't too late.

[Marcia]

>>I've got a soft spot in my heart for AltaVista

Oh me too, RBuzz! The first listing I ever had was there - not that I knew how it happened at the time, but it was so exciting. They were the first search engine I knew of, I used them for everything.

One thing I dislike is that you have to scroll past a whole list of ads before getting to the navigation to go beyond the first page when searching. And of course, the pop-ups. I would love to see a comeback.

What do you guys think about them using snippets instead of the description tag? The ones I checked looked awful familiar to those used "elsewhere" and the results on some were pretty close, too.

[web_india]

Yes, beezer - it does seem altavista is paying some attention to free inclusion too. Got included for free recently.

[Axacta]

I don't understand AltaVista. My site lists for my most important keyword phrase:

About=15
ATW/Fast=4
AOL=7
Ask/Teoma=19
Excite=4
Google=8
LookSmart=16
Lycos=7
MSN=1

Using host: AltaVista indicates that it has my index page in its db, and it has spidered my whole site, but I quit looking a couple of weeks ago at 450, and still no sign of it.

Like I said, I don't understand AltaVista.

[mack]

I would also love AV to make a come back.

It was the first search engine I ever used and still use if for translate.

[athinktank]

In the past two months Scooter has done really deep crawls on my site, thousands of pages. Does anyone have an idea of their update schedule? Have they done an update in the recent past?

[pleeker]

Those of you reporting free inclusion on AV, have you all submitted within just the past couple weeks?

We submitted for one client about 2 months ago and still nothing. Maybe time to try again....

[RBuzz]

AltaVista has announced a new crawling initiative. If I recall correctly, they're checking certain sites for new resources and pointers four times a day. Checking AltaFresh does seem to indicate that they're indexing content a little quicker.

[Knowles]

I rank better in AV than in Google, to bad its not the number one SE!

[Beezer]

Pleeker - I haven't done ANY submission to AV --- these new sites were were completed within the last month - they got spidered and showed up in the SERPS (one of them was #1 for a competitive key phrase) -- within days.

[pleeker]

Beezer - amazing. You should bottle that formula. :)

[rcjordan]

I was just coming to report that AV was making a comeback in my logs, but you've beaten me. I've been noticing a small, but steady amount of referrals for some 3 weeks now. At first, I shrugged them off as incidental traffic, but as it approaches 3 or 4 percent, I'm starting to sit up and take notice. This is on free listings, no fees have ever been paid to spider.

>within just the past couple of weeks

No, this site is well over 2 years old. It's also dynamic, and optimized using noframes.

> I'm thrilled that they're coming back to life. I just hope it isn't too late.

Me, too. In its day, for those that used AV's advanced search, it was every bit as good as Google for deep search. You just didn't have to use anything else except on the rarest, thinnest serps.

[DrCool]

I have also seen some decent results with AltaVista lately. A couple new sites I have were listed and I never even submitted them. They started showing up in AV only after I got the sites listed in Yahoo. Has anybody else seen this connection? I have seen in on at least 5 different occasions. Maybe AV is spidering Yahoo's What's New page?

[Napoleon]

Yes, AV is definitely 100% certain spidering Yahoo's What's New page (or the sub-directory immediately on entry).... I have a new site that is absolutely nowhere else at present.

The quality is definitely improving. I've been monitoring on one particular keyword in my own area. It used to have a totally inappropriate site at #1... that site has been falling steadily for weeks. The returns are now, in my opinion, extremely good.

I also share the opinion of others on here - I'd love to see them make a comeback and hope it isn't too late. Oh... the folly of that 2-3 year period when they forgot they were a search engine!

[Beezer]

The sites that I mentioned that got into AV so quickly got both Yahoo and DMOZ listings around the same time --- not sure what listing preceeded what, though. Deserves a closer look!

[rcjordan]

Though I can't exclude the possibility of a bonus in spidering/ranking for those that are listed in yahoo or odp, neither list the site I was referencing above.

I haven't submitted anything to any se for several years now, so it appears AV has either fluffed the old database, or spidered, or both.

>returns are now, in my opinion, extremely good.

Same here.

>the folly of that 2-3 year period when they forgot they were a search engine!

Somehow, I expect the fact that google A) has received millions of dollars of free press touting their search capabilities, B) is making money, and C) wasn't fingered by the FTC for deceptive advertising practices didn't escape even AV.

[pmac]

I'm pretty sure this is new. For a few KW'S I follow, I am seeing the number 1 position identified with a blue icon. Clicking on it produces the following pop up:

"For popular searches AltaVista provides relevant, high-quality results, called shortcuts, from sources that are not normally available to search engines. All shortcuts have an icon and gray labels telling you their sources. We choose sources based on quality.
To provide shopping shortcuts, we have partnered with DealTime."

It's a shame really because the results have improved, however with the SERP'S littered with paid results and ad's, it kinda takes the shine off.

[Napoleon]

I've never noticed that Pmac.. I'll take a look.

You're certainly right on the ads - too many and the real returns are way too far down on the page. They will have to get this right I believe to make real progress.

[Napoleon]

The feature found by Pmac really is bad... placed right with the valid serps. It's very disappointing to be honest, because I thought AV was rolling forwards nicely - then they go and do that. Horrible, not to mention counter-productive.

[skibum]

AV must be spidering the new YAHOO!/L$ additions. Just launched a site, submitted to YAHOO! and L$ and AV has it indexed already. It was never submitted and had no other incoming links.

[web_india]

I think AV has taken a clue from google and is spidering for free those sites that it finds have got good links from quality sites (no page rank here - so don't know how AV rates the quality sites)

Sounds good, as now we can just focus our strategy on getting good links, and get included in google, aol (thru google), AV and probably ink too ( [webmasterworld.com...] ) for free.

Hoping for better days at AV !