Webmaster Tools Avg Search Position

[pdrs]

Hey guys & gals,

Webmaster tools has me confused, when I look at my search queries it has certain terms listed as avg position number 1 and shows the result as 1 when i expand. But when I punch the term into google (through a proxy) I don't show up anywhere near the first page for the term, let alone the first position.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

Cheers and Thanks!

[PhilipSEO]

Originally Posted by pdrs

Hey guys & gals,

Webmaster tools has me confused, when I look at my search queries it has certain terms listed as avg position number 1 and shows the result as 1 when i expand. But when I punch the term into google (through a proxy) I don't show up anywhere near the first page for the term, let alone the first position.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

Cheers and Thanks!

Google WMT shows the average of the "aggregate" positions at which your site has appeared for the given keyword in all the Google datacenters and in the regional Googles such as google,com, .co.uk, .fr, .it, .ru, etc. And I believe (although Google has not said so) that this includes those cases where personalized search influenced your site's position, causing it to appear "unnaturally" high in the search.