Funny or representative?

I think we all did this a couple of years back but..

[hitchhiker]

[google.com...]

Such gentlemen/women! - How many of us would 'alter' stuff like this if we were G? :)

[tedster]

That's pretty good proof that the results are algorithmic, I'd say -- at least for this search.

[shri]

Hmmm .. wonder if they'd allow their SEO to change a title or H1 tag. ;)

[AlexMiles]

It thinks Dogpile is a better search engine than itself?

Leave it alone, the algos fine!

[tedster]

allow their SEO to change a title or H1 tag

Maybe -- but anchor text is probably verboten.

[walkman]

older links for altavista etc. I guess, or maybe people linked differently (anchor wise) a while back. I forgot...

[shri]

>> Maybe -- but anchor text is probably verboten.

Yeah.. but wouldnt you for once want to test something on a PR10 site.

For purpose of speculation, I'd like to put search engine into their title and see if they can rise a few more notches and get a few more visitors from searchers on Yahoo and MSN. ;)

[arbitrary]

Yeah, but they are already at your search engine when doing the query.

It is probably the best result to show them something else rather than having them run around like a rat on a treadmill getting nowhere.

[tedster]

OMG, the Overture tool shows over a million searches on [search engine]. Now why on earth is that? And if Dogpile has such a good ranking then why doesn't it drive more traffic? And since Danny S is #1, his site should be doing incredibly well (so why haven't any of my clients heard of him?)

I feel like everything I know is wrong and what the bleep do I know.

But it's clear that Google did not tweak this result -- maybe their organic search division is trying to force corporate to spring for an Adwords buy.

[cws3di]

Tedster - I believe you had it absolutely right in your first post - it is all in the ANCHOR text from backlinks.

It seems logical to me that the sites above G have a lot more backlinks to them with that exact search term. When people link to G, they use the term "Google" not the term "Search Engine" in their links.

i.e. this is pretty conclusive evidence IMHO that Anchor Text pulls more weight than what is becoming "old-fashioned" green-bar Page Rank.

[instinct]

IMO this won't stay like this when the current update settles. The results were similar during the last update and were suddenly switched back to 'you know who' at number #1 immediately following.

Draw your own conclusions ;-)

[caveman]

what the bleep do I know

Well, I'll take your opinion over just about anyone else's, FWIW. ;-)

As for this very humorous search (and if it's not funny to you, then you're holding on way too tight) ... ;-)

Seems to me that this reflects half of the whole problem with G's SERP's right now.

All the technical crap aside, bottom line: I don't care that G is not in the #1 spot for this term. What I care about is that G is not featuring a search engine - ANY search engine - in the #1 spot for a search on "search engine."

Yes it's representative. It's representative of how far afield they've gotten from relevance (or perhaps I should say "usefulness"): To the point that their number one result for this search query is a site that comments on the subject of the search query, rather than being representative of the search query.

How far reomved must they get to realize the issues with their current SERP's?

[reseller]

caveman

>>What I care about is that G is not featuring a search engine - ANY search engine - in the #1 spot for a search on "search engine." <<

Good point!

However, looking at the title of the site on #1 spot, make me wonder whether repeating the keyphrase "search engine" twice plus a single keyphrase "search engines" on the <title></title> has, among other factors, an effect on high rankings on the serps according to the current algos!

[sailorjwd]

Now I understand why I can't find my site but I can find 100's of sites that talk about my site :)

[BillyS]

Perhaps they are trying to distance themselves from being just a search engine...

Try this one:

[google.com...]

[oddsod]

Best Search Engine [google.com] and Worst Search Engine [google.com] should provide a few laughs.

[aeiouy]

Worst Search Engine is hysterically funny.

Yet very sad for them.