SolveYourProblem
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) Series
How Does Google Page Rank Really Work?
A
‘Page Rank’ is a number Google gives to a web page that
represents how important Google thinks the
page is on the web. When one page links to another, Google
considers it to be effectively casting a vote for the other
page. The more ‘votes’ there are for a page across the whole
web, the more important that page must be. But that’s quite
an assumption, isn’t it?
The importance of the page that is casting the vote determines
how important the vote itself really is, meaning in Google
calculations a page's importance comes from the votes cast
for it. These votes are then taken into account when the
page is ranked.
As a general rule of thumb, Google
Page Ranks along with Alexa ratings are the best indicators
of how well your SEO
work has been going. Granted, the ranking that you appear
in on the results for your most important key words is the
real indicator, but a strong Google Page Rank will help to
boost this position substantially. The more links that you
have pointing at your site, the better off you are. That’s
a basic rule that will apply throughout your SEO operations.
Page
Rank matters because it’s one of the most influential
factors that determine a page's ranking in Google’s search
results. If you want to have good Page Rank, you’d better
make sure people are linking to your site.
Well, don’t
jump the gun and try to get your site linked from everywhere
you can, because Google doesn’t count every
link. They have started filter out links from known ‘link
farms’ (sites that are nothing but big lists of links), and
being linked to or from these kinds of sites will get you
penalized by Google. Be careful out there. They have also
implemented a new relevance calculator that (true to its
name) tries to determine how relevant the links into and
out of your site are. The most important factor here is that
Google considers long lasting links as more meaningful than
a recently published link.
The best way to increase your page rank is to contact
people with relevant and complementary content (that is, content
that does not compete with your own but that enhances it).
These links are most likely to last and they will not only
increase your Google Page Rank, but they will also provide
relevant hits via the links themselves.
How is PageRank Calculated?
Google calculates the PageRank PR of all pages it indexes,
taking into account all the links to and from each site.
When a page ‘votes’ for other pages by linking to them, it
shares out some of its PageRank value amongst these pages.
This algorithm means that a link to your site from a page
with PR4 (i.e. a Page Rank of 4) and five outbound links
would be worth more than a link from a page with PR8 and
a hundred outbound links. It’s not just the Page Rank of
the page that’s important, but also the number of links it
has.
The
more links there are on a page, the less Page Rank value
your page receives from them. You should also remember that
it takes progressively more Page Rank to move up a level.
It is generally pretty easy to achieve a Page Rank of three.
Once you achieve a Page Rank of four, your site is getting
formidable. Increasing past this mark may prove difficult
and will require very important content. Reaching 8+ is very
difficult. These ranks are usually reserved for sites that
are crucial for the functionality of the internet.
Each
time you add a link, or a page that links to you adds
a link, you run the risk of lowering your PageRank. Make
sure that you have as few links as possible, and so do any
sites that are associated with you.
Google repeats its PageRank calculatons many times at each
update, and each time the calculation is made it gets more
likely to be accurate. Total accuracy can never be achieved,
however, because one site’s PageRank is entirely relative
to the others’. You should understand that the results searchers
end up with can really only be properly worked out by Google,
because they’re the only ones with access to the whole index.
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SolveYourProblem.com : 2007
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