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MSN Favoring IIS Servers in Their SERPs?
(rt) You don’t need to be a conspiracy theory buff not to put it past Microsoft what’s currently causing a stir in blogdom and elsewhere: seems that the Redmond crowd favor Microsoft IIS web server systems in their MSN search results pages (SERPs). At least, that’s what this fairly extensive, untitled study by Ivor Hewitt indicates: a bis of between 7 to 10% towards IIS as compared to Google:
→ http://www.ivor.it/goog/
Here’s the author’s take on it:
Perhaps the MSN search has simply been coded by developers used to talking to IIS machines and so it just does that job better?
Perhaps the MSN spider is taking advantage of some specific IIS features to provide enhanced indexing?
Well, even if so one fails to grasp at first thought what precise mechanics are supposed to be involved here. It seems fairly unlikely that Microsoft is doing it on purpose as it will probably do them more PR harm if found out (as has obviously happened now) than help them sell IIS server systems. It’s not as if they’re actively promoting their IIS product with the sales pitch “better rankings on our SERPs” – at least, not yet, hm.
After receiving some flak because of the insufficient number of searches conducted to allow for reliable results, Ivor is now running another test with no less than 100,000 keywords. So visit his site regularly to find out what his final results will be.
If proven true (and I admit we’re still a mite sceptical), we’ll probably see IIS sales surge as that oldest scourge of SEO / SEM raises its head: ranking hysteria. And so much for the time worn “content is king” paradigme …
If you’d like to follow the ongoing buzz on SEO planet, here are some links, starting with DigitalPoint:
→ DigitalPoint Forum: “MSN Results Biased to IIS servers?”
Of course, this topic is too good for Slashdot to ignore:
→ “MSN Search Engine Favors IIS”
Inevitably, Threadwatch chimes in as well:
→ “IIS Servers Favored by MSN Search”
Here, Nick Wilson sums it up ever so nicely again:
What better argument for a little IP delivery eh?
Couldn’t have put it better myself, Nick!
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[ Keywords: ranking algorithms, search analytics, SEO/SEM market ]
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