Home : Blogs : IMNJ - Internet Marketing Specialist : Internet Marketing Blog

Page Rank... Huh?

huh Page Rank - Huh?

Calculation:

PR(A) = (1-d) + d(PR(t1)/C(t1) + ... + PR(tn)/C(tn))

What the..!

In simpler terms, Page Rank is a numeric value (0 -10) assigned to a web page. The higher the Page Rank value the higher the calculated importance of the page. Google assigns every indexed page a rank which passes “votes”, “authority” or “trust” to the pages it links to. A page can pass a total of 85% of it rank shared by the pages it links to.

links This is a simplification of what is a very complex calculation used by Google. The bottom line is that it made two extremely bright and savvy Stamford University students ultra-rich men. For our purposes we need to understand Page Rank as it relates to your own website and how it ranks in comparison to your competition. It is also equally important to understand the profile of pages linking to you.

When we have an understanding of Page Rank we also can better understand why links matter both qualitative and quantitatively. How many links and of what quality factor into how your site will rank for websites competing for the same keywords. We could also examine the link profile of our websites secondary pages. Second level pages are pages are those linked to from the homepage. In most typical websites the homepage carries the most page rank. We can additionally evaluate how our Page Rank is distributed to our second level pages.

How can I improve my page rank?

Write a great blog. The more valuable content you write the more page rank each page will add to the collective page rank of your site.
Get linked to from other ranked sites including QUALITY directories like DMOZ and Yahoo Directory.
Social Networking helps! Leverage your favorite social media. Sites like MyBlogLog, Twitter, Technorati, Stumbleupon, Del.icio.is, etc.

Other things to keep in mind!

“nofollow” attribute – A HTML link with a nofollow attribute does not pass any Page Rank. Nofollow was created by Google (Matt Cutts) to reduce search engine spam.

Example:

<a href="www.awebsite.com" rel="nofollow">I don’t Trust This Link</a>

page source

Firefox Tip To see the code of the web page you are browsing in Firefox pulldown from the top menu under View and select Page Source or as a shortcut use <ctrl+U>.

Take another look at your own website and dig deeper into your link profile.

Sources:

Craven, Phil . "Google's PageRank Explained." WebWorkshop. . . 23 June, 2008 <http://www.webworkshop.net/pagerank.html>

“Our Search: Google Technology.” Google… 23 June, 2008 <http://www.google.com/technology/>

“Google PageRank: What Do We Know About It?” Smashing Magazine… 23 June, 2008

“PR0 - Google's PageRank 0 Penalty.” eFactory… 23 June, 2008 <http://pr.efactory.de/e-pr0.shtml>

Image Sources:

Chained by smohundro

huh? by momin lens

Posted by IMNJ - Internet Marketing Specialist on 06/23/2008 11:45 PM

Comments (24)

seo, page rank, nofollow

Post is included in group: Active Rain Newbies
Post is included in group: Realtors®
Post is included in group: Rainmaking - Internet Marketing Strategies
Post is included in group: SEO QandA
Post is included in group: ActiveRain Rockstars

24 Comments on Page Rank... Huh?

JUN

2008

thanks for the info and the clarification and the post

Thank you for the info. We will apply it to our site www.AtlantaHomeStore.com

Teresa Johnson

Solid Source Realty

www.AtlantaHomeStore.com

JUN

2008

Very cool information indeed... of course, Google likes to throw all kinds of tweaks into their equitions from time to time.

Chuck - The Google algorithm is regularly and being refined. Google needs to stay aggressive against page spam so that the highest quality results are returned to users.

Howard,

It might also help to post the instructions of how to add a page rank tool to the browser tool bar. There are several, but the one I prefer simply shows a small bar with a sliding green color representing the PR.

That tool helped my understanding a little.

And of course there is the debate about whether or not page rank has significance any more in terms of back linking and SEO.

Also, I appreciate the references. A blog with cited references. Impressive.

And, it that the actual formula for PR?

Thanks,

Richard

Thanks for the information. Active Rain with members like you are a huge help in understanding how to use a blog to our benefit

Nice simple explanation of Page Rank. As you might have guessed I like to stay on top of the serps for my sites because I know how much business it can bring :)

Richard -
Thanks for the comment. You raised a number of good points:
1. Page Rank Tool Bar: This was part of my post "SEO Weekend #1". I recommended the extension called SearchStatus.
2. Page Rank is intended to be one of many metrics we use to judge a page for it Internet relevance. You are correct in stating Page Rank is not an indicator of search rank.
3. That was the original published calculation when it was first being developed by Larry Page. Do you think it is a coincidence it is called "Page" Rank? :D

Jeff & Bill - Thanks for the feedback!

Very interesting post. Thanks for the clarification and for sharing this with us.

O.K. I was with you until the very end (dig deeper into profile). What is that & what does it indicate?

Thanks so much,

I'm reading, listening, and learning! Thanks!

good info, what's frustrating to me is that I have a site with a PR3 but no significant rankings anywhere...I don't quite understand that.

Any help or insight would be most appreciated.

thank you,

www.stuartdobson.com

Yvette -
Take a look at the PR of all the pages on your site. Try to get a sense of why 1 page ranks higher than another. Do all of your inbound links go to your homepage? Do you have links to other content on your site? Try to get a sense for your link profile and understand it better.

Stuart -
I took a brief look at your site. The good news is that your site is well indexed in Google. Unfortunately, as you pointed out you are not ranking well for many of your keyword search terms (in your metatags).
I did see that you’re ranked for "Colorado Home Buying" in #6 Google. I would suggest you refine your keywords and link building campaign.
Another suggestion would be to get a wordpress blog on your domain. featuredblog.com is not going to significantly aid your stuartdobson.com website.
Lastly - take a look at your AR blog. Use less keywords in your blog post. Focus your titles. Aggressively go after your target market in your blog.

Thanks for the wonderful insight on how to improve my page ranking. I didn't know about the no follow thing from Google.

Matthew - glad you were able to get something from my post. Thanks for your feedback.

JUN

2008

Thank you for inviting me to join this group. As I read through this I think I need to start with the basics, if there is such a thing! Do you have any suggestions on some posts or reading materials that may be helpful to start a SEO newbie out with? I look forward to the educating and your advice!

JUN

2008

Jen - Thanks for the feedback. I am running a weekly series called "SEO Weekend" each post has a topic supported with a activity to help you increase awareness about your website and Internet marketing program. If you have a specific question please feel free to make it a blog post and pose it to the group. I look forward to it!

Best Wishes!

JUL

2008

Good tips. Google PR is still one of the best (tho not THE best) indicator of where you'll be ranked. Thanks for the good tips.

Howdy IMNJ

Thank you for helpping ua to understand about Google page ranking better.

I will start using your helpful tips.

God Bless The U.S.A.

JUL

2008

This is my kind of topic. It's so important for all of us to help each other in our separate markets to obtain great rankings and leads. The nofollow thing is pretty darn significant and as recip linking is fading into the yester-year, another great way to obtain inbound links (To aid in your PR) is to comment on other industry blogs frequently. Even if they're tagged dofollow or nofollow it will bring in traffic to your site and if you comment enough, (Quality comments and not spam) you'll gain visitors and inbound links.

- While higher page rank is what we're all after, if you're not showing up on the SE's, it doesn't matter much. I try to make posts that others will link to and benefit from along with making my posts keyphrase and keyword specific to ensure showing up on the first page of the big G. If you write enough quality content and spread it around "The Internets", it ends up being a beautiful snowball rolling toward success.

Thanks for the information. Very useful, indeed.

NOV

2008

NOV

2008

This is great info to know. Thanks so much for posting!

DEC

I popped into SEO tonight and feel like I'm writing the same comment everywhere...but...

I can't get past a PR of 1; I blog consistently 3 to 4 times a week for the last four months and yes, I've moved up for my key words from page 18 to page 2 but I've been stuck on page 2 for weeks. I link back to my website on nearly every post and use my keywords when they make sense; maybe I need to blog on my website...it's a maze this 48 year old real estate agent is struggling with. I am on DMOZ and IRED and a few others, perhaps the other issue is I'm cheap and won't pay the fees YAHOO asks for.

I saw where there is a Starter Guide for Google's SEO on another post, I've printed that out so maybe I'll get a little farther in a few days!