This guide is for you if:
1. You use a rank tracker to track your websiteās keywords positions on Google
and
2. Wonder why the rank tracker shows a rank, while you find nothing on Google by manually searching for it.
Having dealt with this mystery myself, I decided to explain the 4 main reasons for why you see your rankings in your rank tracker but not when manually searching in Google.
Together with that, Iāll also share 2 foolproof methods for checking whether and how your pages are indexed by Google.
4 reasons for keyword ranks showing up in rank tracker but not in manual search
- Google is still adjusting your ranks
- Google is currently testing where you should rank
- Youāre trying to rank in another country
- Itās simply an indexing bug in Google
Now letās explain each of them in detail.
Reason 1. Google Is Still Adjusting Your Ranks āļø
When Google indexes a new page, it needs some time to adjust. When Googlebot visits your page and makes a copy of it on Googleās server, Google needs a bit of time to synchronize that data across all servers worldwide. Considering youāre probably not the only one who has written something on the subject lately, Google has to do that with all of your sites collectively.
Because of that, when your rank tracker checked your ranks, it might have simply ended up on a server that already had that information. Meanwhile, your search might lead you to a server that hasnāt yet. In other words, it could simply be āluck of the drawā.
Reason 2. Google Is Currently Testing Your Ranks š§Ŗ
Google might have already fully indexed your website ā but this time they might already be testing your page in the results.
Google tests pages and the ranking of them in many different ways, here are some examples:
- Only ranking your website in a niche geographical area
- Only ranking your website based on browser history or other data they have on the user
- Google is split testing your ranking. So on some searches they rank you and on others not. Like a lottery.
Reason 3. Youāre Trying To Rank In Another Country šļø
Next up, thereās also the chance that youāre trying to rank in another country or location of where youāre located. This point builds upon the previous one ā if youāre not positioned in the place youāre trying to rank for, Google is simply going to show you results that fit your location (and the data they have about you) rather than the true results for your target location. With Morningscoreās keyword management tool you are able to track keyword rankings down to city level.
Reason 4. Itās Simply An Indexing Bug In Google šŖ²
We canāt skip the fact that Google is running an extremely large operation ā and at such a scale, search bugs can happen rather easily. After all, they are literally downloading every website they find on the internet. Thatās a lot of information! In the process, some things get messed up and this can affect how you see the rankings. This can be either a single instance ā again, simply bad luck. Or they can be temporary ā something that affects search results over a few days. Sometimes Google drops URLs temporarily, which might take you a couple of days to figure out.
Because these things happen all the time (at least more often than you might think) and they can cause you unnecessary confusion.
Letās look at how you can be nearly 100% sure your site is showing up in Google:
How To Check And Confirm Your Site Is On Google
Now, this solution is not fool-proof for the same reasons we listed above. However, it can give you pretty good insights into whether your site is indexed ā which is something you should correctly see the majority of the time after Google has said it is indexed.
Method #1 ā Using A Specific Search Query In Google
The easiest way to see if any particular page on your site is indexed is to use a search query directly in Google. The search query is: āsite:ā followed by the URL of your page.
For example, when I want to check if this blog post will get indexed, Iād simply go to Google.com and enter:
site:https://morningscore.io/showing-rank-tracker-not-manual-search/
Similarly, simply replace the query after āsite:ā with your specific page. And if you run this query for your root domain (e.g. āsite:https://morningscore.io/ā), you will see all of your pages that Google has indexed and added to their index.
Method #2 ā Checking Your āCoverageā In Search Console
The next tip here is to use Google Search Console ā If you donāt already have one, you can follow our guide to set up Google Search Console. It is a very powerful tool that shows you when and how Google scans your website and whether your pages are in their index. For example, you can easily enter a URL in the search bar and immediately see if itās in Googleās index.
If you are already seeing your positions in your rank tracker, the page is indexed and it will display as āURL is on Googleā.
As you can also see in the image above, clicking on the āCoverageā tab will reveal great information about when Google crawled your page last.
Take away: What to think about this ranking difference between a rank tracker and a manual Google search?
These 2 methods canāt fully explain the mystery of why your rank tracker says you rank but you canāt see it. But together with the explanations above you should have a more full picture of what is going on now.
There is no guarantees with Google. Generally speaking Google will serve different rankings to different users, and thatās the main reason for the difference between a rank tracker and your own manual search.
But if your page is not ranked if you use the 2 methods above, I would certainly suspect the rank trackers accuracy or freshness too.