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SEO Page Rank - It’s not about Who YOU Know… ...It’s About Who Knows YOU

Written by: Joyce Evans Erb

Article Overview: Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is part science and part magic. Well, maybe not REAL magic, but there is a lot going on behind the curtain that most folks never get to see. Scoring a Top 10 listing in Google requires a scientific approach towards getting a lot of little pieces set up correctly. And then there’s that hunk of magic. If we were to give that magic portion a name, it would be called “Page Rank (PR).” PR is the technical term for an unknown, unrevealed, unpublished “magic formula” that Google uses to measure a website's link popularity on a scale from 0-10. So how does Page Rank (PR) get calculated?

SEO Page Rank - It’s not about Who YOU Know… ...It’s About Who Knows YOU

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is part science and part magic. Well, maybe not REAL magic, but there is a lot going on behind the curtain that most folks never get to see.

Scoring a Top 10 listing in Google requires a scientific approach towards getting a lot of little pieces set up correctly. And then there’s that hunk of magic.

If we were to give that magic portion a name, it would be called “Page Rank (PR).”

PR is the technical term for an unknown, unrevealed, unpublished “magic formula” that Google uses to measure a website's link popularity on a scale from 0-10.

So how does Page Rank (PR) get calculated?

Google doesn’t tell us all its secrets, but it does reveal some. For instance, Google considers the fact that if one page on one web site is linked to a page on another web site (yours, for example), the first page is “casting a vote” for the value of your page.

These links are called back links because they link back to your site.
Of course, the more pages on different web sites that cast a vote for your page, the more value Google potentially sees in yours.

Potentially is the operative word here. That’s because before assigning a weight to the linking relationship, Google also considers the PR of the page linking to yours.

If the site linking to yours has a high PR, things look rosy for you. However, if you have links coming into your site from places that Google considers to be in bad neighborhoods, or have a low PR, your PR suffers.

Wearing your magician’s hat yet?

It sounds confusing, but look at it this way.

Suppose you are known in your circle of friends as a connoisseur of fine wine. You happen upon a new wine you think it’s the best ever. You tell all your buddies and they rush out to buy it. Why? Because they know you have a good reputation for choosing fine wines.

But suppose you usually buy your wine in cardboard boxes from your local grocer’s bargain wine aisle using coupons?

All of a sudden you’re trying to get your friends to spring for $200 for this new wine you tried? They might not be so willing because you are not a recognized authority on fine wines.

Now is it clearer?

Here comes the hard part.

Getting quality back links is not easy. People who own sites with high PR know that they are sitting on a gold mine. They are not likely to link back to some newbie with a PR of zero just to be nice.

In fact, back linking to a low PR (page rank) site can actually lower their own PR. So you’d better be offering something of real value if you want to do a linking deal.

What kind of value? That depends upon what the other webmaster is looking for. Rarely is it money. Usually it’s high quality content that is 100% relevant their site and that will be of keen interest to their own visitors.

Getting these types of links can be a full-time job. In fact, most serious webmaster outsource back linking to SEO specialists.

And now you probably can see why!

Related Articles
  SEO - How Important is Your Google Page Rank?
  How to earn Google Page Rank
  Understanding what a Link Network is, its SEO and Page Rank Impact
  Building Back links: 3 Important Things to Consider Before you Even Start
  One way reciprocal link exchange theory.

Article Tags: aisle, bargain wine, buddies, cardboard boxes, connoisseur, curtain, fine wine, fine wines, google, hunk, link popularity, little pieces, local grocer, magic formula, magician, new wine, operative word, page rank, real magic, search engine optimization
Referred by: http://www.searchengineworkshops.com



Related Forum Posts
Page Rank Changes - Hi Kevin - there is a lot of speculation as to why so many websites lost Page Rank. A few new sites that I've been following also got Page Rank for the first time. Every time Google does a Page Rank update there are websites that get caught in the crossfire and have to work to get their rankings back up!
www.tobuso.com and www.paperrollshop.com - Please take a look at these and tell me what I should do. I am too close to them to see it objectively at this point. The main on is the tobuso.com one. The other is just a paper roll side bar project. I have had a guy working on tobuso.com for about 2 weeks or so. I really dont understand why it doesnt have any Google Page Rank yet. I am starting to move up in the rankings for my targeted keyword but I am lacking in the google Page Rank and cannot figure out why. I guess it may just take more time. See if that is what it looks like to you.
Link Exchange Page Rank - Hi Shimmy, You should also look at the PageRank of the site that want to link to you. Most webmasters who look for link exchanges are very new and don't have any authority online. You won't get much benefit from a link with them. But if the site has a higher Page Rank you are much more likely to benefit. One way links are always better than link exchanges but you do still benefit from link exchanges with high quality Page Rank sites from my experience.
Nofollow Backlinks - Martin - I wouldn't rule out interior links. They may appear as 0 Page Rank because they just came online but over time they will gain PR. That Seth Godin inside post that Takuya sent is a Page Rank 5 now. Russell - Most blogs carry the nofollow link. You should check it out before posting a comment if you're doing it for SEO reasons. You can download a plugin for firefox that tells you which links are nofollow but another way to find out is to go to view --> page source and look next to the external links on the blog comments. If it says "no follow" next to them then Google doesn't count it as a link. Some forums also do "no follow" when you put your website in your signature (mine don't) so you want to check it out before getting too involved.
Page Rank Boost! - Looks like you got a nice boost from the Page Rank update as well franchisebrief!


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