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Thanks For The Search Suggestion, Are You Trying To Tell Me Something?
By Matt Keough | August 16, 2007
Search operators are a part of any backlink research. Whether for a client or a competitor, getting a better idea of “who’s linkin’ who” is an essential activity. Both “link:” and “site:” operators are routine. I usually prefer to use “link:” on Yahoo!, it provides a more complete picture than Google. However, recently started to type in my Firefox search bar and saw something odd. As Firefox uses Google Suggest, it made suggestions as to how to complete my search. Here is a screen capture.
Here is how the search looked at Google Suggest. It has additional details.
Can you make any guess as to why these particular sites were offered? Recent searches by Google engineers? Random websites? A crafty bit of subterfuge designed to make search engine marketers obsess over something new?
It didn’t obsess. I just went over to Google Suggest and tried a “site” operator. Gad Zounds! My search found more delicious oddity there.
I don’t seriously believe that there are hidden messages found here. But it is certainly not a list of most popular sites or sites with the deepest crawls. Perhaps it is an illustration that these operators are useful for sites of all sizes and link popularity. Any ideas?
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August 17th, 2007 at 10:29 am
I wonder if it’s random. I doubt they’re paying big bucks to appear there.
August 17th, 2007 at 10:54 am
Is anything in life REALLY random? It may be an arbitrary selection, but it is repeatable. The same sites came up when I searched a few days after I originally noticed this.