Google serves up different results every time!

what gives?

[ace2000]

We checked our ranking for a particular search term and the first time we did the query we ranked #2. The second time we never even ranked on the second page. In fact, it appears that we are only ranking in the #2 spot about 60% of the time. What gives? Is Google shaking up it's results to put more results on the first page?

[DerekH]

ace2000
Google has a number of different data centres, and the query databases that they each contain are generally accepted to be slightly different, because each is updated independently of the others.

Google queries go through a load balancer so that althought your query is usually answered by the most local centre, it may not be.

These dynamic considerations conspire to mean that repeated searches on the same term often yield several different sets of results.
DerekH