Google result backwards?

[Jim Sewell]

Hi. I'm putting this here since it's not directly related to the Challenge but I wondered if anyone has some insight.

I did a Google search on a term I am using, at least so far, in The Challenge so I'll not say it here. When I did a search for - Waterproof Blue Widgets - no quotes - on Google it says About 773,000 results. I do the same search on the same exact term inside quotes - "Waterproof Blue Widgets" and it says About 10,700,000 results.

That is totally backwards from anything taught in the Challenge, anything I have ever seen and anything that makes sense logically.

Does anyone have an idea what's going on to make the quoted search return more than the broad term search?

[Paul Barber]

Have you repeated the broad match search and got the same result?

[Jim Sewell]

I just retested. The three-word phrase gives me 10M hits in quotes and only 608K without quotes (down from 773K earlier). All three words are significant and not ignored words like "the". Seems very strange to me.

[Leon]

Number of Google results are estimates and sometimes completely wrong. Set results per page to 100, get to the last SERP page and see how many there really are.

Here's an example
"phytopharm hoodia gordonii" shows 235,000 for broad and 714,000 for phrase. If you set 100 results per page and scroll down for phrase match, you can see there are only 2 SERPs, and if you check the second SERP page, you get the actual number - 155. If you do the same for broad match, the number of pages doesn't change, but only 966 pages are shown, others are omitted for being duplicates.

[mmeadwolfe]

Guy 1: "Guess how many marbles are in the jar and win!"
Google: "Uh... 714,000!!!"
Guy 1: "No Google... 155, you suck at math"
Google: "You just wait, one day Ill be great with estimates!"

[Jim Sewell]

Ah, that explains it perfectly. Thanks guys! I wonder why Google estimates... don't they have the search info right there in the computer and can do a search on them to see how many match? Oh well, there's probably a reason somewhere for it. Maybe it's speed.

[Jahawk]

Number of Google results are estimates and sometimes completely wrong. Set results per page to 100, get to the last SERP page and see how many there really are.

Here's an example
"phytopharm hoodia gordonii" shows 235,000 for broad and 714,000 for phrase. If you set 100 results per page and scroll down for phrase match, you can see there are only 2 SERPs, and if you check the second SERP page, you get the actual number - 155. If you do the same for broad match, the number of pages doesn't change, but only 966 pages are shown, others are omitted for being duplicates.

I have seen the same thing...another one of those googlish things google does.
Its another good reason for using multiple sources to due thorough research.

[mmeadwolfe]

I'm still at a loss as to how Google can mistake the number 257 (total results + omissions) for being about 789k. I mean its only 3000 times larger. Anybody have any reasonings behind the huge discrepancy?

[DeanRichards]

I'm still at a loss as to how Google can mistake the number 257 (total results + omissions) for being about 789k. I mean its only 3000 times larger. Anybody have any reasonings behind the huge discrepancy?

I think there are several issues here. The first is that Google is never wrong. Different samples from different data centers will sometimes yield vastly different numbers, but they aren't mistakes, they are just artifacts of a dynamic system in constant global flux. Never trust a single Google result in anything and I never even trust the same day's numbers. Check them today, check them tomorrow, check them next week.

The next thing to consider is that what you type into a search box at Google is the second most important thing to them. The most important thing to Google is not what you type, but what you mean.

Google knows that different words can mean the same thing and they know that the same words can mean different things. Google knows just how messy language really is. So they use what you type to try to figure out what you really mean and then give you the answer for that.

In other words, Google interprets everything you type into the search box.

So when you type in - phytopharm hoodia gordonii - there isn't much ambiguity so they say these 235K pages cover the meaning of those words. When you type in "phytopharm hoodia gordonii" in quotes, you're saying I want to know about this specific phrase, so they begrudgingly give you the larger number of results (with some interpretation thrown in for good measure).

The biggest mistake is to think that Google is a simple machine. It's a machine, but it is far from simple and it certainly doesn't bow to our simplistic ideas of arithmetical logic. Anyway, this is my best guess at what we're seeing here. I could be wrong. The guys who really know exactly how Google works aren't talking.

[JaredOnTop]

I'm not sure that this really clears things up. While everything Dean says is correct, MeadWolfe makes a very good point regarding the degree of difference between actual and estimated results being tremendous. There has to be something else going on here.