Tuesday 16 February 2010

Strange Searches

This is one of the huge welcoming signs for Go...Image via Wikipedia
I like to take an occasional look at how people get here to this dusty little corner of the Internet – the results are almost always rewarding in some strange way. There are a number of perennial favourites - I still ‘own’ the immortal nmkl pjkl ftmch and this picture of a plastic chicken is still highly popular – as well as some new delights. And people searching for words like mafsoum, akid and mafi still land here, which is a giggle!



Souks
Keeping this blog going for years has finally paid off. If you Google souks, this moany little collection of near-daily offcuts is number seven search result in the world out of something a little over 400,000 results. Tada! I am now a recognised and leading authority on souks! I shall have a sheriff badge made.

Cow Aorta
If you’re looking for cow aortas, believe it or not, this is the world's number one place to find them thanks to the RTA’s slightly strange looking sustainability campaign trophy thingy.After that, you get about 98,000 scientific journals and things talking about real cow aortas.

Klazart Authonomy
It is amazing to me that anyone’s still interested in this! Gamer Vineet Balla, AKA Klazart, ‘gamed’ the Harper Collins authonomy website in early 2009 by inviting a horde of gamer buddies to vote his book to the top. This resulted in a great deal of authorial brouhaha at the time, but oddly someone, somewhere, is still interested in the incident. Someone also found this here fusty wee blog by searching ‘how to move to rank 1 on authonomy’. I wouldn’t bother, mate.


Someone else also found da blog by Googling 'Eva Bartholdy' which pulled me up short - she's  a character from my first book, spoof international thriller Space (which, incidentally, made it to the authonomy editor's desk and was part of the proof that the editor's desk thingy wasn't really worth it in the first place).

Womin fack animal
Somewhere in the world, a drooling pervert with acute dyslexia got this instead of what he was looking for. And I am glad.

fake indian driving license in Australia
Don't ask me. It lands on this.  I get a lot of fakes - fake cheque books, fake plastic coconuts, fake driving tests, fake numerologists, fake plastic tokens, fake soybean plants, fake windscreen cracks, fake Hiltis and fake camels. Fake camels really does boggle the mind...

people you know and trust are somewhat fake?
Part of the Great Fake Series, this one had a slightly sad and betrayed air to it. Luckily it lands on advice from me of no value whatsoever.


us food is crap
Number three search result in all the multiverse! I'm quite proud of that.  I'm equally proud that hundreds (if not thousands by now) have searched for the ingredients of, or directly for, Pringles and Aquafina - and got to my posts outlining quite how both of these mildly egregious products are manufactured.

Sexy Tweets
Okay, I wrote a post about how to Tweet Sexy.  I wonder if the Googler in question got what he/she really wanted?


nimble 80286
If you persist to the second page of search results you get this, but why anybody would want to search for a diet bread and a processor beats me.

Phillipa Fioretti
Through no fault of her own, people are starting to search for my writer friend Pip and landing here. This won't last as she is soon to be playing in much more stellar company - her first novel, The Book of Love, goes on sale in Australia on April 1 and, of course, I am hoping that it is going to sell like billy-o, thereby relegating her fleeting involvement in this shameful little blog to the millionth page of search results after all those glowing reviews by otherwise hard-bitten critics.

eeste
God alone knows what it is and in which esoteric language, but searching for 'eeste' gets you this post on ve middul eeste pee aar awordes, the title inspired of course by one Nigel Molesworth. Maybe it's the brilliant new name for Vegemite after they dumped iSnack 2.0...

To all of you who have been deceived into coming here because of the strangeness of SEO, I am sorry but there is nothing of much use to anyone here. To those of you that keep coming by for some mad reason of your own, thank you for your visit. Don't forget to wash the handbasin on your way out for the convenience of other guests.
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6 comments:

Mita said...

How very Alexander McNabb - I can always count on you to be quirky and interesting! That's why the Google paths end up in your blog!

Sabina E. said...

very nice. I also hope the best for Phillipa's novel debut!

Dubai Photo Story said...

ha ha ha.... very interesting!!!

If I may as... how does one track search words? Which service/SW do you use?

Phillipa said...

I had a good laugh at this post and rushed off to see what my most common search words were. Tits is a big one, why this should be so I have no idea as their are no breasts featured on my blog, however, someone is very particular as the various searches are 'young,flat,pink,celebrity,women's,smooth and beaten(!)'each ocurring on separate days. A few others are 'barley recipes,'sexy roman', 'dark eyed white ferret' and 'homemade women's gangster costumes.'
An interesting insight into Net usage.My book and myself are coming tops in the search query's - so thats something. I'd know all was not well if it was 'dar eyed Roman ferret with smooth tits'.

Para Glider said...

After a decent interval, I must write a similar post for the Paranormal Hotel. I've also got several weird search strings tied down, among them one I certainly wasn't shooting for - any phrase with the words 'gay' and 'Doha' comes straight to my door, thanks to a spoof article I did about Doha's first gay club (the de facto result of banning women from a bar!)

To answer Dubai Photo Story - the free widget by 'Feedjit' tracks visitors, where they come from and what they are searching. It's on the Para blog if you want to take a look.

Alexander said...

I think we all pick up our favourite whackoes through search!

Another answer to the question is Sitemeter, which is what I use. It also picks up stats on visitors, search phrases, page views & paths and all that good stuff.

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