But as in all SETI speculations, we are relying mostly on guesswork. What follows is even more speculation.

If ETIs are using the planetary transit method for exoplanet detection, a Doppler technique, or some other technique which is more sensitive in that direction (big "ifs"), then anyone who has spotted our planet will most likely be in our ecliptic plane.

However the highest stellar density is in the galactic plane, there are more potential targets there. The ecliptic and galactic equator intersect in two places at an angle of 60 degrees, one of them in Sagittarius, only 4 degrees from the densly populated galactic center! That's where I'd look!

Some astrobiologists feel that radial chemical gradients in the galactic plane are optimal for life at our distance, so the best directions to look are in the galactic plane at right angles to a radius from the nucleus to us. I personally don't accept that, I feel the spread in metallicity among stars varies enormously locally, regardless of what the general trend is, and would mask this effect.

Still, there are a lot of factors that might skew our statistics. For example, the Milky Way, particular towards the center, is most populated with stars, but we are probably only able to see nearby targets with our level of technology, so it may not really matter much in which direction we look. The galaxy is a thousand light years thick at our location, I doubt if any method we (or they) employ would be much good past that distance (the Milky Way is 100K ly across, and we are 30K ly from the center).

It also depends a lot on our aliens, too. I would guess their knowledge of astronomy and planetary formation, as well as their understanding of the proportion of worlds with life, is so far ahead of ours they don't really need to search for planets and life. They probably already have a good idea of how many suitable planets are in the galaxy, and what proportion of them have life. My guess is their searches will be optimized to search for intelligence, not planets or life.

It's even possible that they already have located other civilizations and are even engaged in dialog with them, they would have much less incentive to find new civilizations once they were involved in communication with others. I suspect that they may resemble us in this respect: why invest in expensive searches when they get more bang from their buck by upgrading their existing com links?