Google Webmaster Tools - Top Search Queries, accurate or far off the mark?

[cat7ken]

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I'm still very much a newbie and still very much befuddled by the mysterious workings of Google. As mentioned in the Google Updating thread my latest and, IMHO, greatest website disappeared last weekend having promisingly to position 11 giving me lots of hope for a top 5 position in October. So there it is - Gone.

Yet Webmaster tools as of yesterday is still reporting me as having position number 4 for two of my main search phrases and page one positions for several juicy key phrases. And during the last few weeks the positions reported by Webmaster Tools bore liitle relationship to what I found during my own UK and global searches being somewhat optimistic.

Any thoughts on whether GWTs still reporting me as having high positions means that I will return shortly and the general accuracy of GWTs top search queries?

Edited to add - I've finally found myself at position 190, I've returned to where I started weeks ago. But not position 4 like GWTs reports! Weird.

Cheers

Ken

[sabian1982]

Far off the mark im afaid - hopefully they will be updating it to be more 'real time' in the future!

[City_Tiger]

Keep in mind that Google does have many different data centers that often show different results.

It could be that the one Google uses in webmaster tools is not the one you see - hence the difference.

That said, it is rare that I find they match up with what I see so this theory may be wrong

[mikey_gee]

Very inaccurate in my opinion. Most of the changes i make seem to take 4 weeks plus before GWT highlights the change. It is useful to refer to every now and again for checking links and dead pages though.

MG.

[aotagain]

For a long time now, I've only used Webmaster Tools for 'clues', as most of the info. is all over the shop.

Good for weeding out 404's and errors on a big site and other purely technical stuff.

Qualitative information is just plain misleading - until there's some message that says "this information was based on information in the week commencing....", then its not a lot of use.

[sabian1982]

But then again, the search volumes on Google Keyword Tool are wholey inaccurate as well lol