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The Undeniable Power of Google’s PageRank
The Undeniable Power of Google’s PageRank
At least it should be undeniable!
Quote from a POST in the Article Underground Private Forum:
“I have heard in the training of 3 seperate “SEO experts”
that PR does not influence your SERP.”
OH BOY! This Article Underground Forum post opened up a can of worms! Can of worms in the sense that it got me going on a very important subject: PageRank.
In this post I will share some of my responses in that post from an Article Underground member who said that
Quote:
“I am beginning to question the value of PR as it pertains to
linking. I have heard in the training of 3 seperate “SEO
experts” that PR does not influence your SERP. So I am
left to wonder why we spend so much time and money
trying to accquire links from high PR sites.”
Please do not question the value of PageRank as it pertains to linking. There is no evidence that “it has no influence on rankings”
I’ve only seen evidence to the contrary. PageRank in links pointing at sites has a huge impact.
A good text link from a high PageRank page will pass along MAGICAL POWERS.
Yep, I said that… magical powers. You can quote me on that because I have seen it happen many times.
Please point out those 3 people and tell us exactly what they said if you can. It may just be your interpretation that they said “PR does not influence your SERP”, because it certainly does. Or maybe the quote s out of context.
If they really said that and meant it, they most certainly have never spent any time trying to get top rankings, or maybe they just don’t pay attention to what kind of links they get.
Now, I’m not suprised when people try to tell you not to pay attention to PageRank (lazy SEOs say this often), or maybe they say PageRank is not important, or that PR is not the only factor, but to say it has NO INFLUENCE is wreckless.
Possibly the statement may have been twisted or taken out of context….
If you do not believe PageRank from links or even on pages has an impact on rankings - please look at this page and try to explain why ALL of the top ten results for credit cards have high PageRank (PR5 or higher).
–
credit card
1 PageRank 8
2 PageRank 6
3 PageRank 7
4 PageRank 8
5 PageRank 5
6 PageRank 7
7 PageRank 6
8 PageRank 6
9 PageRank 7
10 PageRank 6
The average PageRank of the top 10 spots on Google for credit card is 6.6
2 of the top 10 have PR of 8
3 of the top 10 have PR of 7
And the lowest PR in the top 10 is 5 (there is one page with PR 5).
–
So can anyone honestly say that PageRank has NO influence on rankings???
Still not convinced or think that is an anomaly???
Look at these searches and note the pageRank of the pages. Coincidence???
–
Dating Advice
Average PageRank 5.4
–
Marketing
Average PageRank 6.6
Yes that is a competitive KEYWORD but same happens as you move on to less competitive phrases too. Tey just have less average PageRank.
–
Even a less competitive search phrase still has it’s fair share of PageRank in the top ten results!
Clam Chowder
Five of the pages were PageRank 5 and above
Average PageRank 4.4
–
Nike Air Force One
Average PageRank 4.6
–
So, tell me… if PageRank really has no influence, how come there aren’t ANY pages with low PageRank on the top tens of the above examples???
Sure, PageRank is NOT the only factor - it is just one of the MOST IMPORTANT factors that help pages get top rankings.
You can ignore it and still make money - but if you actually believe it has no impact - well, that is simply wrong.
Doesn’t mean you need PageRank to make money in search engines, it just means the more yu have and the better quality links you have, the more top rankings YOU will have.
This is not the first time I have seen people try to defend the position that PageRank is not important. They are usually from people who have sites that have little PageRank.
I guarantee you if you want to get top rankings for search queries that can make you many thousands of dollars you will need to start accumulating PageRank.
If however you do not want to have think about it - and only plan on getting rankings for words that have ZERO competition - well, you’ll make a little money.
But trust me on this, even for those of us that go after primarily “low hanging fruit” which is OK and a noble thing, there will come opportunities for you where just a few extra links (ie more PageRank) can make the difference between being on Page 2 of the results or being on Page 1.
Thes opportunities to make 10 or 20 times as much from ONE WEB PAGE are what seperates the men from the boys, so to speak.
I have no intention of demeaning anyone or putting anyone down… all I am saying is that if you want those “runaway hits” I have told you about, you’ll need to start getting rankings on words that get good traffic and have some competition.
That’s how you get those $100. or $200. dollar days. By getting a top ten ranking on something that has decent traffic.
It can be done! BUT if your sites have little to no PageRank you simply can’t compete with the level of sites that occupy many of the front pages of most of the popular high traffic searches.
Please don’t misunderstand me. I’m not saying to change your focus and start going after phrases like “credit card”. That’s next to inmpossible to rank on. Trust me!
But hey - there is money in “clam chowder” and “Nike Air Force One” which are LESS competitive, but still competitive none the less.
So, my advice is to continue to target the low hanging fruit, but be aware that any link you can get from a high PageRank page will help put yo in the major leagues, not just the minors. So don’t get obsessd with PR but by all means - make going after it a big part of your business plan… that is if you want to make the really big bucks!
Let me say - much of this stuff is opinion - so trust whomever you want on this - but MUCH of it - such as with the examples above are BASED ON FACTS.
Quote:
“I think that’s somewhat of an exaggeration, but the effect of PR on SERP is negligible. Think about it. If you go to a site by typing the url into your address bar, you’ll see PR in your google toolbar. Now ask yourself… “What keyword phrase is that PR relevant to?”
Quote:
“the effect of PR on SERP is negligible”
That simply is not true. Sorry pardner…
I’ll try to explain why what you said is incorrect….
As I demonstrated above PageRank has a dramatic impact on how web pages - notice how I said WEB PAGES - can rank for competitive phrases (each page has it’s own PageRank).
It’s all about TRUST.
When a web page has several or even MANY links pointing at it that have high pagerank THE PAGE ITSELF WILL BECOME A high PR page - so now that page will gain “magical powers” or TRUST.
Magical in the sense that when PUSH comes to SHOVE, a low PageRank or NO pagerank page will get pushed to the side when it comes time to rank.
With many millions of pages that may have the target words on it, Google needs to trust some of those pages MORE than the rest. Which ones do you think they’ll trust more??? the ones with the higher Pagernk perhaps???
OF COURSE THEY WILL! Their system of PageRank helps them TRUST AUTHORITIES BEFORE the masses and high PageRank pages are AUTHORITATIVE and garner more trust than a NEW PAGE or a low PR page. That’s just the way it is.
Because if a PageRank 7 page that has PR 8 and 7 and 6 links pointing at it has earned a reputation for CREDIT and CARDS, it will have magical powers for almost ANY phrase that has those 2 words.
So when it comes time for Google to rank on anything that a high PageRank page has earned a reputation for, the HIGH PR ones will ALWAYS rise to the top.
THEN the other factors are considered.
It’s not the PageRank itself - because if that were the case APPLE and CNN would rank number one for everything.
But trust me on this - if Google had the choice to pick a page that has earned a repution for CREDIT CARDS and they see ONE page has 20 links pointing at it with “credit cards” and the links are all PR 4 or lower and there is a site that has 5 links pointing at it with PR 7 and 8 links and also has credit cards in the link text, the ONE that has the higher PageRank links pointing at it will usually rise above and move to the top.
In other words, if all things were the same PageRank wise and neither had high PageRank links with the PROPER TEXTpointing at it - THEN and THEN ONLY would they start looking at the LINK TEXT OVERALL.
So, in my opinion what Google does is FIRSt look for HIGH PAGERANK LINKS that CONTAIN the PROPER LINK TEXT (in the search query) and THEn it will factor in the REST of the link text form other links.
Because Google is set up to TRUST it’s high PageRank pages MORE than a page that has LITTLE or no PageRank.
Quote:
“What keyword phrase is that PR relevant to?”
The keyword phrase that PageRank is relevant to DEPENDS on the LINK TEXT of the PAGES that SENT the PageRank.
It’s not black or white or A or B - it’s a COMBINATION of factors.
When a PageRank 8 WEB PAGE (not the site) sends you a link and gives you PAGERANK POWER it not only gives you the NUMBER it also GIVES YOU MAGIC JUICE for the LINK TEXT that it used to link to you.
That’s the key.
If a PageRank 8 page links to your “credit card” page with the shitty link text “CLICK HERE” it will NOT give you PageRank power for “credit card”. It will still send you the NUMBER or PR 8 POWER, it will just not be good for your REPUTATION.
That’s better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick, but ideally you WANT BOTH - high PageRank link WITH PERFECT LINK TEXT>
Good LINK TEXT and HIGH PR is a GRAND SLAM home run my friends.
The “CLICK HERE” link from a PageRank 8 page is still a HOME RUN, it’s just not a GRAND SLAM.
It will give you a LITTLE MAGIC but not the SAME MAGIC as PERFECT LINK TEXT and HIGH PAGERANK will give you.
Quote:
“So either the PR has a verrrrry low weighting factor, or it’s used only as a last resort. Sort of a “tie-breaker” when multiple relevant pages rank the same.”
Not true. It’s the PageRank of the PAGE that LINKED TO YOU combined with the LINK TEXT pointing at your page. Higher PageRank pages that link to you with the pHRASE in the LINK TEXT is what make YOUR web page have high PageRank and High RELEVANCE and make them rise to the top of the rankings.
It’s NOT SO MUCH how much PageRank YOUR page has - it’s how much the page that sent you has - and whether it sends you with GOOD LINK TEXT.
YOU WANT BOTH of those things FROM as MANY pages as you can get links from! The more the better!
Google trusts pages with HIGH PAGE RANK and it likes GOOD LINK TEXT a lot!
If you get links to YOUR WEB PAGES from High PageRank pages that have the RIGHT LINK TEXT you will rise to the top every time.
It’s mainly a question of whether your competition has better links than you do.
Hope that helps. I better stop now… I need to go find some high PageRank links for my web pages!
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Well explained, Mike.
I found your page in google, searching for “pr and serp”. Your page is well ranked for this keywords, although the PR of this page is, at this time, zero. It seems a little contradictory, but I imagine that this keyword is not very competitive, so the “in page” factors (not the PR) are more important.
Comment by sanabara — October 19, 2006 @ 2:03 am