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Google Page Rank - Important or Just Another Number?
By Richard Grady (c) 2004

In my last newsletter, I wrote about how your website's Alexa
rating is not actually that important to the success of your 
online business. In this issue, I want to look at another popular 
statistic - Google Page Rank - and ask a similar question - is 
it that important?

First a quick overview as to what the Google Page Rank actually 
is...

Google Page Rank (or PR as it is often referred to as) is simply 
an indication of the number of websites that link to a specific 
website. It also attempts to indicate the quality of those links. 
PR ranges from 0 to 10 (with 10 being the 'best' PR and 0 being 
the 'worst'). The vast majority of small business websites will 
usually find they have a PR of between 0 and 5.

To calculate a particular sites PR, Google uses a fairly 
complicated algorithm based on the number of web links that it 
is aware of that link to the site in question. This algorithm 
will also take into account the PR of the page that is providing 
the link. Thus, a link from a web page that has a PR of 7 will 
be considered more valuable than a link from a page with a PR 
of 4.  

Because of the way in which links from higher PR-ranked sites 
are considered more important, many people are choosing to buy 
links from websites with high PR's just so that they can increase 
their own PR. I have seen sites selling a simple text link on 
their home page for over $700 a month purely based on the fact 
that they have a PR of 7 or above. This may seem like a lot of 
money but when you consider that the website owners who are 
buying these links often have websites that are in no way 
relevant to the content of the site linking to them, it is 
absolutely ridiculous.

Take this example, let's say you have a website about health and 
fitness and you buy a link for $500 a month from a random website 
because it has a PR of 7. This random website has no relevance 
to your health and fitness site so what is going to happen? 
Well, your own PR may increase as a result of the link. You may 
get a bit of extra traffic but probably not much since people 
don't click on links that that they are not interested in. You 
will definitely be $500 poorer at the end of the month!

Instead, why not spend the $500 on pay-per-click advertising and 
benefit from some quality, targeted traffic? 

Of course, there is a bit more to it than that and the reason 
that most people want to increase their PR is because Google 
takes this statistic into account when determining where a 
website will be displayed in their search results. Many people 
assume that a high PR automatically equals a high search engine 
placement for their chosen keywords. Not so....

PR is just one of over 100 different factors that Google takes 
into account when deciding where your website will feature (and 
these factors and the main algorithm change on a very regular 
basis). It is perfectly possible for a website with a PR of 5 to 
get a higher ranking than a PR 7 site if it has better content 
or is more relevant for the search term in question.

Remember that relevance is all important with Google and a link 
from a website that is not relevant to your own site will be 
considered far less important than a relevant one (which makes 
buying links from random sites primarily because they have a 
high PR even more crazy).

I have read several rumours lately that Google hasn't updated 
PR's for a couple of months and they are considering phasing PR 
out or modifying it in some way. This is pure speculation but it 
wouldn't surprise me in the least. PR is easily manipulated (for 
example by purchasing links as described above) and Google 
doesn't like to have their calculations or search results 
manipulated. It stands to reason that they are looking at ways 
of preventing this.

So, in summary, is Google Page Rank important to your business?

Well, it is a good indicator of how many other sites link to 
yours and how important Google considers your site to be, BUT I 
personally don't place too much importance on this statistic and 
I certainly won't be paying out for a link from a website just 
because it has a high PR.

As I said above, Google changes it's rules on a regular basis 
and I see little point in chasing a particular PR on the basis 
that it might get you higher search engine rankings. If Google 
does decide to do away with PR, all your work will have been for 
nothing.

Instead, concentrate on building quality, relevant links from 
sites that are connected in some way to your own site content. 
This will ensure that any traffic you receive via these links 
will at least have an interest in your site. Building links on 
this basis will automatically increase your PR over time 
(without the need to pay out for overpriced, irrelevant links). 
If you do things this way and Google does scrap the PR indicator, 
it shouldn't affect you in any way and the links you have in 
place will continue to benefit you.

Remember, in the same way that a low Alexa rating doesn't
guarantee traffic or sales, neither does a high PR. Sure a high 
PR is a 'nice to have' but lots of traffic and high sales is 
even nicer :-)

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Richard Grady has been helping people earn online since 1998. 
Find out more about Richard at: http://www.thetraderonline.com 
Free wholesale search engines: UK- http://www.wholesale118.co.uk 
and US- http://www.thewholesaletrader.com 
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