Google's "pages indexed" dance - shifting site: operator results

[dickbaker]

I launched a new site in a very competitive niche back in May. As I've been adding content, I've been watching Google's index, which seems to change a couple of times a day.

I can do a site:www.mysite.com search and get 161 results, which is the total number of pages I have right now. A few hours later the same search will return about 130 results. Another search later on will return 161 results, but at 89 results I get the "In order to show you the most relevant results, we have omitted some entries very similar.." message.

I've checked the datacenters, and they all return the same results, whether it's 161 or 89.

The last new site I launched was in 2004, and I don't recall having to wait this long for Google to get the index right.

Has anyone else experienced this, or does anyone have any idea what's going on?

[indias next no1]

yes, in our country there carnatic, folk and other types of dances, in gulf there is belly dance and in whole we call the american and european dances as "western dance", now i like to list a new dance type called "Google Dance", but the sad point is that, in other types anyone can learn the dance, here the google dance is no learnable. if you learn something this hour, you will be out-houred ( a new term for out-dated ) there will be no set of results.

Oh Google, please be stable, we don't like your dance.!

[jobonet]

I noticed that today that on Google the site:www.mysite.com for my site is returning only a fraction of the sites pages (2000). site:mysite.com (without the www) returns the normal number of pages (55,000). This change happened today. I do have Google Webmaster Tools preferred domain set to www.mysite.com since 2006. Is anyone else seeing this? Any thoughts?

Thank you,

Joe

[edited by: tedster at 4:26 pm (utc) on Nov. 14, 2007]
[edit reason] moved from another location [/edit]

[SEOPTI]

You can forget what site: returns.

It is important what site:www.example.* returns.

Only URLs which are NOT in the supplemental index will bring you traffic.

[dickbaker]

"It is important what site:www.example.* returns."

That's great. I ran that search, and only 8 of my 164 pages showed up.

After 5 1/2 months of creating fresh content, submitting to quality niche-related directories, adding content to social networking sites, writing articles for article submission sites, carefully monitoring sites I exchange links with...and I only have eight pages in the main index?

I think I'll go out and sit in the car in the garage with the motor running.

[tedster]

That supplemental index is becoming a monster. I think its function is changing.

[fishfinger]

I only have one site that has a large number of Supplementals and I am seeing that

1. site:www.domain.com -site:www.domain.com/*

gives a message that it 'did not match any documents'

2. site:www.domain.com/&

returns the same 64 results as

3. site:www.domain.com/*

In other words I don't think these operators are working anymore. Can other people still get Google to return Supplemental results only?

Also, site: on its own says that there are 134 results, but once you click through them this number changes to 64 results. These are the same 64 results that operators (2) and (3) show.

[SEOPTI]

dickbaker, to get 164 URLs in the main index you don't need a lot of PR to send into the site. A few PR4 should do the job.

One important part of their supplemental index algo are fresh incoming links, you need fresh links all the time to keep a certain level of pages in the main index.

[edited by: SEOPTI at 1:49 pm (utc) on Nov. 15, 2007]

[fishfinger]

Also, rather than just reyling solely on the site: operator, do two things :

1) search for sentences from each page in "quotes" to see if Google throws up a result, and if it does

2) search for phrases from each page's title tag and check the top 100 rankings to see if you are there

Your site is a real baby in Google's eyes at under 6 months. Plus the index is all over the place at the moment. When it is, newer sites and pages notice more extreme fluctuations. Older sites, pages and their indexing/rankings are more 'sticky'.

[marodhum]

Hi all,
I also noticed the same thing a few days back, and its still going on. Everyday a few of my pages are going out of google index. :(
Earlier i changed my inlink structure to full URL, i.e. ../mypage.html to http://example.com/mypage.html.
So i am worried, coz, if that is the reason for my vanishing pages. Or is any major google update is going on now?

[edited by: tedster at 4:26 am (utc) on Dec. 18, 2007]
[edit reason] switch to example.com - it can never be owned [/edit]