MSN(beta) is Now Live
By Jim Hedger, StepForth News Editor, StepForth
Placement Inc., January 20, 2005
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MSN has removed the beta-wrap from its proprietary search engine and is
now showing self-generated results at MSN.Com. Beta results had started
bleeding into MSN listings over the past three weeks but since Sunday (Jan
16), the .COM (US / Global) version of MSN has consistently mirrored those
found at MSN(beta). Regional versions of MSN continue to display Inktomi
(Yahoo owned) / Regional partner generated results (Jan19, 05).
At this time two years ago, Google was the only major search database,
feeding search results to Yahoo and eventually by extension to MSN. Around
this time last year, Yahoo began to break away from Google by amalgamating
data from its acquisitions of Overture, AlltheWeb, AltaVista and Inktomi
into a monster database built on the dbase they bought from FAST. This
was a huge project that resulted in a database almost as large as Google's.
When Yahoo stopped using Google generated results, MSN stopped showing
them
as well. At the same time, a new spider named MSNbot was making its presence
known, appearing in our clients' server-logs with amazing frequency.
The introduction of an MSN search engine makes the business world of
search a lot more interesting and might help open the door for other
smaller firms such as Lycos and Ask Jeeves to gain a toehold against
Google. However
MSN changes the business of search, it will help improve on the science
of it by innovation rather than invention.
The engineers at MSN have had the luxury of watching everyone else invent
dozens of wheels. They have had the time to see what works well and what
makes money. They have watched great ideas that should have succeeded
fall to failure and not so great ideas flourish until the market determined
their
death. Having created much of the environment themselves, they also know
the histories of the web and appear to have learned when to act and when
to lay-low.
The search engine that they have produced takes factors that worked well
for others and combined them to make what could become a very popular
search tool.
Like Google, MSN's spider finds new sites by following links directed
to those sites. MSNbot is active all the time. So active in fact that
about five weeks ago a few webmasters reported so many visits their servers
crashed.
MSN revisits sites very frequently. Over the past year, MSN has compiled
a 5-Billion site database.
Once a site is in the database, MSN looks at the number of links directed
to that site. There is no hard data on the role topical relevancy plays
in how MSN determines links however it is assumed by most that anchor
text plays a major role. (Anchor text did factor in our initial tests
however with the beta version of the engine)
Next, MSN looks at the content of the site. This is where much of the
ranking determination is made. Sites with great text and clear internal
link-paths are ranking very well with MSN. Of our entire client base,
only one site with excellent text and internal linking lost a top placement
at
MSN when the new version was introduced. Strong, keyword enriched titles
and body texts continue to provide strong placements. We are fairly certain
that the anchor text of internal links can influence placements as well.
Size matters with MSN as larger sites with long-term content appear to
be doing very well under more generic keyword searches. Content rich
news and information sites and large corporate sites should be able to
leverage their size and content-scope into high placements. The size
and content-scope
factor should also work well with large e-commerce sites, provided a
very
clear mapping technique makes the site as easy to access as possible
for MSNbot.
There is a simple experiment that folks should run every time a new search
engine is introduced or a new algorithm is applied. Open three browser
windows (or click on the following links) and cue up MSN.Com, Google.Com,
and Yahoo.Com.
Enter a keyword phrase important to your business or interests. For
this example, I will use one I am familiar with, "Artificial Turf".
Look for similarities between what you know works at Google and Yahoo
and you can learn what works well at MSN. The Field Turf website ranks
#1 at each of the Big3 under the phrase "artificial turf". The
index page itself is dynamically generated and does not always present the
same
text information limiting the effectiveness of seo-copyrighting and keyword
densities. There are several remaining areas on the site SEO work could
be applied and a number of off-site factors that collectively contribute
to the site's top placements. Based on this simple test, we can determine
the following.
A website that has a large number of incoming links will get noticed
and spidered a number of times. Google recognizes 131 unique domains
linking to the Field Turf website. Yahoo notes over 1000. MSN sees far
more, weighing
in above 1500. Next, note the "quality" of incoming links. Google
is taking a very refined approach to contextual-quality while Yahoo and
MSN seem more interested in the number of links.
Titles make a big difference at all three and are an important area
to work on when doing basic SEO for MSN. MSN also seems to be able to
read
text found in drop-down menus such as the ones on the right hand side
of the Field Turf index page.
Another important factor in improving and retaining rankings is updating
the site. MSN states on its "How MSN Search Works" page that pages
that are active will be spidered more frequently and achieve stronger
rankings.
The business of search has changed radically over the past four months,
working through a scenario that has been building for about two years.
MSN going live with their own search engine is huge news with as many
unknown implications as known ones. Its presence will challenge many
basic assumptions
about SEO and will play a large hand in determining the future of the
search
industry itself. The greatest general change is the burst of corporate
diversity and identity in the search marketplace. A range of new products
and services
has been introduced by every search tool from the Big3 to the dozen
or so smaller but notable search firms. Google is buying ad-space and
fiber
optics.
Yahoo is reporting massive earnings as it pushes into the Chinese market,
and MSN is suddenly in the house, so to speak. The precursors of change
are written on the wall and MSN is betting much of that change will
be found between the walls of your home.
More on MSN very soon.
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