Producing Ranking Reports

what form should the keywords be in?

[allybongo]

In a previous post I mentioned that I had no rankings on Altavista. However after looking a little closer found I ranked no. 1 if I put the keyword phrase in inverted commas and also with + inbetween the words (which is the way I always search).

I have to produce ranking reports for my clients. Should I be including all variations of each keyword phrase? Does anyone know what percentage of people use the inverted commas and + signs?

I dont want to be conning my client into thinking he's doing really well when everyone is searching by just typing the words and not finding him!

Thanks!

[rogerd]

You should report on the plain keywords without special modifiers like quotes and plus marks. Relatively few searchers know how to use the advanced syntax, and those the DO know how often don't bother unless they are getting poor results from the plain words.

I have seen not-so-ethical SEOs use this kind of gimmickry to impress clients. It's a lot easier to rank #1 on,
"big fuzzy blue widgets"
than on
big fuzzy blue widgets

[Mike_Mackin]

And guess who RANKS for big fuzzy blue widgets [overture.com] :) hehehe

[allybongo]

thanks, I'll bear that in mind. I just find it strange that we dont even get a ranking when the words are on their own. The words are still there, in the same order on the site!

Its all too bizarre!

[rogerd]

It's not really bizarre, ally, it's just that you rank well for the phrase but not the individual words. There may be thousands (or millions) of pages that have all the words on them, but a much smaller number that incorporate the exact phrase, or include the exact phrase with sufficient density, etc., to rank well for it.

[JayC]

It's not really odd at all, Allybongo. Do the search and look at how many results are found. I just tried one three-word term and went from 39,000 results to 61 when I enclosed the term in quotes. Reduce the competition, and it's easier to be at the top... so that's part of it.

The words are still there, in the same order on the site!

If you look at the sites that you find returned when you don't use quotes, you'll probably see that a lot of them -- even some of the highest-ranked pages -- don't have the words contiguous and in the same order in which you're typing them. That's certainly going to help the ranking, but it's just one of many factors -- and you're leaving all of those pages out when you search on the exact phrase.

[Robert Charlton]

>>And guess who RANKS for big fuzzy blue widgets<<

Check out big fuzzy blue widgets [google.com] on Google... Much more impressive. ;)