Monday, April 20, 2015

Google search results all over the place on different computers at Westfield Doncaster.

The other day I decided to do some testing for the site Fun Date Ideas. For the testing I wanted to use computers other than mine so off I trundled to Westfield Doncaster. There's a number of shops with computers so I popped into the Apple store. That was where I got a bit of a surprise.

The site www.fundateideas.com.au for me appears on the first page of Google usually around position six (pat on the back for my SEO assistance) but I got a bit of a surprise. The site didn't come up as expected. I tried another computer and still no site. This was so weird. Off to JB Hi-Fi. OK. This time they've got their own filtering software loaded but at least the site was in position 10. Not around the middle as expected. So off to Myer. At last the Fun Date Ideas site appeared where I'd normally expect to see it.

I trundled back to the Apple store as something was definitely not quite right, but I couldn't put my finger on it. After quite a bit of testing I found the Apple store computers were set as though they were based in Sydney. At last I'd found the reason. Google's search can be set for a location and if for some reason it gets it wrong, or location for the device has been set to something unexpected, the results for two people in the same location could be vastly different.

Whilst basing the results on the location can be quite useful, I've found whilst travelling this can give totally unexpected results. In Greece my first challenge when I visited the Google site was to change the language from Greek. That was unexpected. Sometimes for me what Google is doing makes sense, but at other times makes no sense at all. I suspect it took around an hour of testing to work out what was going on as this is an option I'd never seen before. Such a waste of time, although I can always do with the exercise.

I thought I'd share this story so that others know that under Tools section in Google there is now the ability to change the location. Of course this offers a great opportunity for practical jokes on fellow offices workers, but seriously, if the results you aren't seeing aren't what you expect, check the location. Often unexpected results are a sign of malware and the browser being hijacked, but in this case it is what software developers would call a feature.

Kelvin Eldridge
www.OnlineConnections.com.au
Helping local business to be found, consistently in the same way every time.

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