9 replies to this topic

[SEOigloo]

Hi Everybody,
Has something happened to the SEO for Firefox widget? For the past 3 days, I am getting no data in Google's SERPs from it. Anyone else noticing this?
Miriam

[joedolson]

I don't know the widget - can you provide a link to it?

[SEOigloo]

Sorry, Joe. I mean Aaron Wall's tool. Does that help?

The basic function of SEO for FF is that, when you're looking at Google's SERPs, each entry is accompanied by a row of stats such as link count, domain age, .edu links, etc.

I use it pretty much daily and for the last few days, the function has disappeared from my Google SERPs and I don't know why.

Miriam

[bwelford]

I downloaded it but all the data shows as ?s. Is that what you're seeing, Miriam?

[Jordban]

Mine didn't work as well, then today i got the option to update, so i did.

Check for an update!

[rustybrick]

This is the same thing that is going on with WebPosition Gold and other screen scraping tools. Google is changing up the html to mess with scrapers, making the tools less effective.

[SEOigloo]

Hi Barry W.
I have seen the ??? thing in the past, but right now, I'm just seeing nothing.

Jordban -
Did you get some kind of an automatic prompt to update? I haven't gotten one. On Aaron's page, there are instructions for getting an update, which I attempted to follow, but the process wasn't bringing up exactly the same popups for me that were shown in the screenshots on his page, so I couldn't find an update that way.

Barry S.
Uh-oh, I didn't realize that. I wonder, then, if anything can be done to restore this tool to its former usefulness. I started using SEO for FF when Jim Boykin's similar tool became paid-only. I will be really chagrined if I can no longer use Aaron's. Thank for mentioning what you know.

Miriam

[DrPete]

Aaron replied to someone on Twitter this week about something similar, but it was just:

"I just used it and it worked for me. Make sure you updated to the most recent version. Also use the delay setting for heavy usage"

Are you using FF3? I've noticed some minor compatibility issues on plug-ins, but they seem to mostly be getting ironed out over time. Sorry, that's not the most helpful answer.

[webformatique]

Hi there,

I agree. with the advice above, check out Google's new look, with the actual search results coming up when you start typing in a search term, keyword elite, IBP, SEO for firefox, they are taking away the tools we use to make sure there search's are done organically.

They take away paid links. I think Google are getting too Big for there own Boots. Its called the internet not Google.

[phaithful]

Hey Neil, Welcome to the forums!

... they are taking away the tools we use to make sure there search's are done organically

I don't actually think they're doing it on purpose to specifically take away the search tools. With any type of new release (e.g. new product, maintenance, bug fix), there are bound to be changes to the presentation layer (e.g. the markup aka HTML).

Since a large majority of the SEO tools are based on some sort of scraping and pattern matching, it's only natural that when Google updates their presentation layer, those SEO tools will break.

3rd party SEO tools are great, and I think the ones like Aaron Wall's which are free help build the SEO community as a whole by providing a great data mining tool. However, I would never build a business or rely heavily on any one of these 3rd party tools. At any given time, the maintainer could decide to stop development or like Miriam mentioned, the tool owner decides to make it a paid product. Or in this case, you'll have to wait for the maintainer to update the pattern parser.

The best way to ensure you get the data you need is to build your own tools, and maintain them yourself.

Edited by phaithful, 28 August 2008 - 12:31 PM.