How does Freshbot define an "updated page"

[sarahk]

Does Freshbot compare the old html with the new html, or does it simply look at the file date?

I have noticed that it has a server variable HTTP_IF_MODIFIED_SINCE.

Does this mean I should refresh my index.php file every day? Or do the changes have to be genuine?

[jeremy goodrich]

If you are interested in getting the benefit of the 'fresh' traffic, I would recommend actually changing your pages, and NOT relying on some 'trick'.

Think of it this way: if you get visitors looking for 'new info' on your widgets, and they get the same tired old STUFF, won't they be a bit disappointed?

If it *is* new content, it will do well - try things that would make your users happy.

The details of exactly how their 'rapid indexing' bot / cycle are fuzzy at best - it would be to Google's disadvantage if every webmaster on the planet started to make 'fake updates' to their sites just to try & get a traffic jump, so their algorithm more than likely would adapt to sort out what is a true 'change' and what is a 'trick'.

[Yidaki]

>every webmaster on the planet started to make 'fake updates' to their sites just to try & get a traffic jump, ...

bah, too late - many webmasters allready know about this "trick" and use it.

>... so their algorithm more than likely would adapt to sort out what is a true 'change' and what is a 'trick'

i expect this to happen sooner than googleguy would admit it. ;)

Sarahk, changing the response header of a web server to allways return "fresh pages" to attract any freshbot is poor webmastering. Writing daily news and content is a lot of work but keeps your visitors and crawlers returning - that is good webmastering.

>Or do the changes have to be genuine?

Sorry, but that's a really strange question... :/
Ask yourself: if you'd do a search for the latest info or the freshest site about yourwidgettheme and you''d find the top results to be older than the cache date says, you'd prob one day start to complain about your "competitor cheating with news fakes", no!? ;)

[sarahk]

Hi Jeremy

I have a page that has had significant changes over the last few months, has some important product support info on it but Google seems to be ignoring it.

I believe that if Freshbot finds the home page has changed it calls Deepbot in to check the rest of the site. Well my home page rarely changes (it's like a brochure) but the inner pages have changing content so I need a way to tell Freshbot that the other pages have changed.

I'm not trying to "trick" Google, more work with it. Over time I've read about many tricks but I'm way too fainthearted to try them.

Yidaki -- not all sites are "news" sites or aim to attract frequent revisits. Some of us just want our sites to be represented accurately for the first time visitor.

thanks for the reply

Sarah

[g1smd]

I had a page that had been fresh listed several times per week for several weeks, then all of a sudden even though the content still changed every few days it wasn't fresh listed for over a week. Then it got fresh listed again, twice, two days apart, and continued to be fresh listed every two days for the next two weeks without making any changes to the page at all. Fresh can sometimes be an enigma. [webmasterworld.com ]

[msgraph]

From Googleguy himself:

[webmasterworld.com...]

[sarahk]

We have an infamous politician down this way who wrote a book called "I've been thinking" and it's become a bit of a catch phrase.

So, I've been thinking...

I log a search engine hit when a page is delivered - the log is the last thing before the </body></html> tags are sent out to the browser.

Now - am I right here - if Freshbot comes along, gets the headers, sees no changes so doesn't get the page then I'm going to be none the wiser!

How do people catch these hits in their logs?