Titles change depending on the query

[graeme_p]

I did a search like "red widget mysitename"

and the title of the SERPS were of the form "red widget - mysitename home"

The words after the dash come from the home page link text.

I have not seen it before.

I have not been able to reproduce it with other searches. I have tried things like "red widget category" and "red widget blue widget" and the titles continue to use just my title tags.

[tedster]

That's the exact effect Google is aiming for - they sometimes augment or even change the title tag when their algorithm says that the change "should attract" more clicks. Your example is a good one - if the query looks navigational, then their studies say that including the domain name in the title should draw more clicks.

So it's not that Google is just changing titles every time they appear for any search whatsoever. There is some logic behind when they do make change, when they don't, and what exact change gets executed.