16 replies to this topic

[kevinl]

I've heard that using tools such as 'Free Monitor for Google' to check a site's postion against certain keywords can actually harm your rankings.

It does seem to be against Google's policy to use such software and that's as good a reason as any not to, but what are your opinions and experiences?

Has anyone been dropped by Google and can positively point the blame at such tools?

Cheers
KevinL

[TaraMc]

Kevinl,

I have used ranking monitoring software in the past but none of the websites were ever excluding from the index because of it, however I used the tools in moderation especially when querying Google.

Hope this helps

[Jill]

It's against Google's terms of service to use automated tools to check your rankings, unless you are going through Google's API interface.

Jill

[dannysullivan]

Google's been the most vocal about rank checking tools. They don't like it at all, but those using them in moderation aren't likely to be noticed.

If you do get spotted, Google generally will prevent you from running searches on Google. They have never tried to use rank checking as a reason to ban pages themselves or attach penalties. That's a good policy, too -- it would mean anyone could rank check their competitors into oblivion.

So no, rank checking shouldn't case a rank decrease at Google, if you are caught. But having said that, rank checking might attract attention to your site -- and if you are doing other things that Google doesn't like in terms of content, then that might get you booted or penalized.

As for the other search engines, they've not made much if any noise about rank checking other than Northern Light -- and they've been out of the web search space for ages now.

Also always interesting, while Google doesn't like rank checking tools, that doesn't stop them from taking ads for such products:

http://www.google.co...8&q=webposition

Remember, if you are going to use such tools, don't do things like search for your company name, URL or terms that would clearly identify who you are.

[Jill]

Welcome, Danny!

Jill

[Scottie]

Welcome Danny!

[AgentWebRanking]

Hi Kevinl,

I do work for a search engine ranking software company. I do agree with Danny point of view about Google
Anyway we have also added Google Web Api to AgentWebRanking.

BTW: hope to see you in Paris at imitiki.com: Google.fr, Overture.fr, Espotting.fr... will be there

Fabien

[Scottie]

Welcome, Fabien!

[Marc]

Hi kevin,

just another suggestion to check your popularity - keyword rank and saturation....

I use Funnel Web Analyzer to grab my log files and generate hit/keyword search reports etc....and then use MarketLeap.com to see how I ranked for the keywords people hit me with.

Take Care!

[digitalpoint]

The best thing to do for searching Google ranks is to simple adhere to their terms of service and use a product or service that uses their API.

Google definitely is the most vocal about not using automated systems to grab search results (without the API), but at least they give you an API to do it properly. The API is better anyway because it's not subject to formatting changes like the "normal" search results are. So it's less likely to break.

In fact, I wish other search engines had a similar API (even if it has nothing to do with their terms of service).

- Shawn

[Tawnya]

Can someone explain to me what the Google API is and what it actually does? I am a bit out of the loop here and would love to hear what it is all about.

Tawnya

[Randy]

The Google API is something they have developed which allows programmers to develop applications which will work seamlessly with Google. Their web page with more detailed info is at http://www.google.com/apis/

Basically, you can apply for an API license. The license allows you to use up to 1,000 queries per day.

One of the tools you can build, which is being discussed in this thread, is a Google Ranking Checker. With a license and some software you can plug in your domain and keyword phrases and check to see where you rank.

There are some sites out there already where you can pay to use their software (with your license) to do this. It's pretty simple to do actually with a server, as long as you have SOAP (some required software) installed on the server.

Personally, I'm not really keen on the idea of putting something like that on one of my servers because I'd be afraid the rules would change and I'd end up getting every domain on that server blacklisted somehow. Paranoid? Maybe. But then again maybe I'm just a good Sys Admin and don't want to be screwing up anything for the folks I host.

The safest and sanest way to use an API application IMO is to run it off of your local PC. So as soon as I can find some time I think I'm going to make a little VB application people can run from their own PC's instead of a server.

I have a very rudimentary version of this already done which I've been testing for the last week or so. It works fine, but I built the test script so that it only checks one keyword phrase at a time to keep things simple on the coding side of things. As soon as I find the time I'll add in some looping capabilities so that multiple keywords can be checked at the same time. Since I currently have a 6 page long To Do list on the site development side of things I can't promise how quickly I'll get back to this one. If I don't find some time soon I'll probably stick it in as a SourceForge project and look for a couple of helpers, though it really shouldn't take that much effort to beef it up a bit. Either way, the plan is to release it as a freebie application.

Randy

ps Yes I'll post back here when it gets close to find a few beta testers who already have an API license.

Edited by Randy, 26 September 2003 - 09:17 PM.

[Marc]

Hi Tawnya,


API = Applications Programming Interface

basically it's a system of functions/methods to help with your code to manipulate something, there's all kinds of API's or SDK (Developer Kits) another example...Verisign also has one to help developers code for shopping cart transactions, Credit Cards...etc

here's a link to Google's API, it has an FAQ link and other information
Google API

Take Care
Marc

[Alan Perkins]

You can use the Google API but the terms of service for the API specifically state

The Google Web APIs service is made available to you for your personal, non-commercial use only

(Emphasis added.)

i.e. you may use the API to measure rankings, but not as part of a commercial service.

Outside the API, automated rank checkers are in breach both of Google's Terms of Service and (more importantly, IMO) the robots.txt protocol. Google's robots.txt file contains the line

Disallow: /search

This means that any robot (such as an automated rank checker) is in breach of the protocol if it queries Google's search results. Note that other engines' robots.txt files, such as AllTheWeb's robots.txt file, contain similar exclusions. It's not just Google.

[digitalpoint]

Also, if you get written permission from Google to use the API to make a commercial product/service it's also allowed then of course too (although ours is free, so it's not commercial).

- Shawn