Search engine positioning?

[yvt360]

Our website is ranked #1 on Alta Vista if you do a search for many searches. Pretty much all of the same sites are listed in Google, but we are around 9-10 for many of the same searches. Alta Vista has picked up on many more of the sites linking to us, could that be the reason?
I have also heard that in some cases Alta Vista is almost a crystal ball for what will be showing up in Google 4-6 months down the road. Is there any truth to that?
I wasn't sure if I should believe that.

[edited by: agerhart at 12:55 pm (utc) on Oct. 17, 2003]
[edit reason] removed specifics [/edit]

[rmjvol]

Hi yvt360,

I'd honestly be quite surprised if "Alta Vista has picked up on many more of the sites linking" to you. If you're checking your backlinks in Google, keep in mind that they don't show all links. So more than likely, AV is just "displaying" more links to you.

The difference in rank could be 1 of hundreds of different factors but more than likely it's a combination of several factors. It boils down to AV & Google have different ranking algorithms.

The crystal ball part is one of the funnier things I've heard today.

Just work on adding good content and getting more links to your site. That's the best way to go after higher rankings in Google.

Good luck,
rmjvol