A Soft Google Page Rank Update this time
Ajith | Dec 2008 | Site Promotion, SEO, Updates From Us
Google has come up with their last page rank update of the year 2008 today! Unlike their previous PR updates, this time around Google has been more or less soft on most domain main (or home) pages as many of them retained or even improved their ranks. Hence the PR update this time has been a good New Year gift for many a blogger.
Google PR update is really something that most bloggers and webmasters look forward to and dread about. PR essentially means money and visibility for bloggers (Perhaps it means nothing for the common – today when I searched the All-Acronyms site for the short-form PR, I was surprised to learn that it didn’t exist there amongst 344 possible definitions for PR. I, in fact, submitted it there immediately). Anyway, as for D$, there was no change in the homepage PR, though I was expecting a PR4 this time. But as I maintained earlier, one has to dig into more details than just the home page PR.
Reading beyond the homepage PR…
As I just mentioned, a Google PR update is much much more than the number allotted for your homepage. It also mean the mass update done on your content and the way your posts and pages are indexed and recognized. Though I was disappointed that my homepage PR did not increase to 4, I am happy about the following internal outcome.
- One third of my posts received a page rank – varying from PR 0 to 3
- Unique and quality content was rewarded very high – e.g. My article on Microsoft Oxite received PR3 and many other unique posts received PR2
- Almost all my posts were indexed by Google
- My search visits % has been steadily increasing, of late
Lessons learned & Action plan
The following are the lessons learned and I have drawn an action plan to make things even better in the future:
- If you keep producing quality content, it doesn’t take more than a few days before it gets indexed and rewarded
- Several (more than 50%) of my posts may need a little more backlink building and SEO optimization to make them visible in Google’s eyes. Sometimes, the content may be unique but you have to convince Google. I have actually shortlisted more than 30 posts that I will be editing soon for better SEO and also use as comment targets on no-nofollow blogs. Basically a high PR on homepage and not many pages with good internal PRs don’t make any sense
- If you are in the good books of Google, you can go places (Remember my tip on backlinking to Google. There are a couple more tips as well which I shall publish soon)
- Google is not hostile towards other brands like Microsoft, WordPress or Bidvertiser as articles on those topics were not ignored but actually got good PR based on the content quality
- Backlinks (from related content) play a major role in getting better PRs. Some pages that had good number of backlinks from unrelated content did not get even PR0
- You need to worry about your no-nofollow outbound links. I took out 3-4 links (including blogroll ones) that were not good for this blog
Over to you…
Please let me know how this PR update has been for your blog? Though, I verified that most of my regular commenters are not suffered this time (and actually got better PRs in some cases), please take a moment to analyze your internal pages’ PRs and comment here on the same.
Happy Blogging!
Ajith,
Thanks for notifying that Google has updated the PR.
My “The Geek Stuff ” Blog is at PR4 now. I am very happy with the results.
I didn’t think about checking non-home page PRs until you’ve mentioned here. What is the best way to identify all the top PR pages of a site?
I used prchecker.info website to quickly check few individual pages from my website. Some of them are at PR4 and PR3. But, there are several posts that are either N/A or 0.
I would follow your suggestion and try to give a facelift and some SEO to gain little more visibility.
Ramesh @ The Geek Stuf’s last blog post… How To Manage Dell Servers using OMSA – OpenManage Server Administrator On Linux
Well, I see you’ve published your article. And I’ll be waiting for your additional tips.
The Velvet Blues site did get a range of 0-4 for some articles, but the homepage has disappointingly stayed at PR4.
And yes, backlinks are key. The posts that have the most and better quality backlinks are those that have the highest PRs. Although, some posts – namely those about Google – which didn’t have too many backlinks, also ranked highly… which is explained by your comment on ‘giving Google love’.
Yeh, reoptimizing older posts is key. I often go back and improve posts to make them more search-engine-friendly.
Shirley’s last blog post… What’s Up With The Wikipedia Plea for Donations?
Congrats !! Me too steady on PR3. just few inner pages upgraded to 1 and 2.
Wish you a new year !!
Abhishek’s last blog post… Clean Up time
Congrats to all the readers of Dollar Shower who got positive PR update. I am satisfied that my 3 month old blog (Domain Marvelous) got a toolbar PR of 3 from N/A. Almost 50-70% of my internal pages also got a PR of 3.
Comments about the importance of PR, or rather lack of it, is sure to follow here on this post. Webmasters who got an increase in PR would be glorifying Google, while those who got negative PR’s would again discount it as of no value. This in spite of their personal beliefs.
The fact is, something is better than nothing! If PR had absolutely no importance, why would Google exhaust its time, employees and hardware/software resources in tracking the billions upon billions of pages and assigning them PR’s?
Some also state that Google PR is somewhat not implemented properly. I ask… the geniuses who have designed a search algorithm that is virtually ruling the cyberspace suddenly cannot implement a simple concept of grading websites. Really something to ponder about…. Moreover, why would Google keep something operational that is flawed throughout?
Domain Marvelous’s last blog post… Welcome, 2009
I got PR 4 on home page this time
Talking about inner pages, one of my internal page got PR 5 !!
So this was great gift for me by Google.
Chetan’s last blog post… Move or remove close buttons on tabs in Firefox
Got a pr 1 from not available in 28 days of existence. Expecting to reach atleast pr 3 by the next update… Congrats to all of you too.
Kurt Avish’s last blog post… Happy New Year 2009 Mauritius and the World!!!
My TechZoomIn got PR4..Am very happy because its only 3months old and jumped from PR0 to PR4
Congrats for everyone for their PR’s
TechZoomIn’s last blog post… Monthly Round Up:Best posts on TechZoomIn from Dec 2008
Congratz for improvements in your internal PR’s. Q2 of 2008 turned out really bad for me. I was beaten down by Google after enabling doFollow plugin & selling few text links. As a result of this my PR dropped from PR3 to PR0 just within 2 updates. Now, as I have learned from my mistakes, I am going to rework on SEO for the whole site. So, I am just hoping get better some PR in their next updates.
Prasanna’s last blog post… TechSagar celebrating its first birthday
I just recently performed necromancy on my blog http://www.sphaggy.net
I hope I will be getting the same success as you are.
Congratulations!
@Ramesh, congratulations on your PR4. It’s been an amazing journey for The Geek Stuff…and I checked your internal PRs… Many of your posts have PR3 and 4 thanks to wonderful linking to your technical posts (I use the mechanisms described in one of my older posts to chech internal PRs)…ie. Using PaRaMeter and sitemap.
@Shirley, Up to PR4 may be relatively easier but to get PR5 and 6 you may need to either get/buy stronger backlinks or write really unique content that can link bait.
Good to learn that the Google love trick worked for you as well
@Abhishek, congrats on retaining your PR… A Happy New Year to you too…
@Forsaken, you must have done an exceptionally good job to get PR3 for most of your internal pages as well… Especially with a very young domain…
@Chetan, congrats on PR4… I guess, you have been very aggressive on backlink building via comments
@Kurt, congrats on PR1 in such a short time frame…
@Lax, mind explaining what exactly you did to get a PR4…I am asking this to TGS as well as Chetan
@Pras, looks like you have been hit by infrequent updates. DoFollow plugin will screw up your site for sure and so is text-link-ads selling
@Kristo, thanks for your visit and wishing you all the best for getting the right valued PR for you….
I got a PR3 on my 5 week old blog so I really can’t complain about pr, it’s definitely going to help me sell some ad space, that’s for sure.
and most are PR0 one or two are N/A and one is a PR2.
Umm I checked all 9 of my posts
In all fairness though, I don’t have all that many pages, so I wasn’t expecting much for inner pages.
Blog for Bloggers’s last blog post… Getting Comments On Your New Blog: How I Do It
It was a great update for me. Went from 2 to 4 on two of my blogs, and from 0 to 2 on the other one. I was at PR2 for so long, I was getting discouraged.
Jodith’s last blog post… Easily Manage Time Zones
I’m happy as well. DSWM got it’s 3 back and a brand new blog scored a 1.
Dennis Edell’s last blog post… Top Commenter Contest – January – Is On!
Ajith,
Wishing you a Happy New year!!
I am on the same boat as you. even my PR didn’t change. it is on 3 only. No problem. Hope your PR gets changed in next google update.
Happy Blogging!
Nihar’s last blog post… Wishing you a Happy New Year 2009
@Ardit, Getting PR3 in less than five weeks is just amazing… You must have got some really good backlinks
@Jodith, Wow a 2 to 4 jump is really great! Guess, it was worth the wait.
@Dennis, great going buddy! Did you loose PR3 earlier due to any text link sale?
@Nihar, Happy New Year to you too…! Yep, let’s hope that the next PR update will be better for us
My PR went up from PR2 to PR3 which I found quite surprising as I only started the blog in August. Still, PR isn’t what drives me, it’s the thrill of getting someone to leave a comment that makes it all worthwhile.
Sire’s last blog post… Happy New Year & Birth Of Link Love
@Sire, that is a good news considering the fact that you benefited from the last two PR updates… PR can drive you if you are using monetization instruments based on the same
But definitely good content visibility and participation (comments) give you more satisfaction
Noooooo, no text link for me man. I posted about it a while back, when it went down I thought I knew why.
Long story short, in between PR updates I deleted (re-drafted) about 40 posts at the same time. They were filled with suckyness from “posting for the sake of posting”, so I took ‘em back to re-do/update and then planned to re-post in plenty of time for the next update about 3 months away.
An excellent plan in theory, yes? Not realizing I would end up in the hospital/physical rehab just days later, and be there for 2 odd months.
OK so that was “long story not quite as long” LOL
Dennis Edell’s last blog post… Top Commenter Contest – January – Is On!
@Dennis, I did a bulk edit sometime back and at that time the number of pages indexed reduced big time… Fortunately things are back to normal, I just need to concentrate on more SEO and homepage PR alone. Inside PRs look good.
@ Ajith – I haven’t checked inner pages. Is there a way to do that without clicking EVERY INDIVIDUAL LINK? lol, that would be a bit time consuming…
Note: I’m using WP 2.6.3
Dennis Edell’s last blog post… Top Commenter Contest – January – Is On!
@Dennis, I already answered it (in reply to Ramesh’s query). Please use PaRaMeter and your sitemap.xml to get it in one shot as mentioned in this post…
Get Page Ranks of All Pages on your Blog
Cool thanks, I’ll check it out.
Dennis Edell’s last blog post… Top Commenter Contest – January – Is On!
PR 3 is still a decent PR.
phil’s last blog post… Nokia 2630
oh, you didn’t get the magical pr 4? well, maybe next update. I got mine (at last) and it’s PR 3! I’m so happy.
“Patience is Virtue, Passion is a gift”
Happy New Year!
qarla’s last blog post… Bernard Palanca, Certified Kapuso Na!
Grats for the raise in PR for your internal pages. This shows that the post you have been delivering are quality ones. I have realise an article that I wrote actually got a higher PR than my homepage which makes it wierd isn’t it? To add on to this, it is actually a sponsored review.
Wei Liang
@phil, you are right… But there’re differences from beginning stage => popular => massively popular
So we are all stuck at the beginning to moderately popular levels.
@qarla, you have been worried about your PR aren’t you
Congrats on PR3…and a Happy New Year to you too (Needless to say, Patience is Virtue is my favorite statement as well.
@Felix, getting an internal PR higher than your homepage is quite possible. Especially for those pages with special content. For example, due to 100s of Winning the Web rating widgets pointing to Gyutae’s WTB IM rating page he got a PR5 on that but homepage is PR3
When this happens, you should tap the most out of it by editing that high PR post and internal linking five or six of your good (and related posts) from there. Such linked posts will get decent PR soon as well (no need to wait for the next PR update for that to happen)
Ajith,
I used PaRaMeter based on your suggestion to find out PR for all my internal links.
It is a wonderful tool and worked beautifully. Thanks a lot for your suggestion.
Ramesh @ The Geek Stuf’s last blog post… Happy New Year 2009 – From Geek and The Doll
Ramesh, Good to know that it was of use to you… If used carefully, it can be of help to analyze your competitors content as well
and accordingly take measures. Another use is to find high PR pages on dofollow blogs.
Congrats to you !! Few of my domain are drop
.
But I’m happy my main domain are still PR 4
My new blog just got a boost to PR 2, which is nice. Now I’m looking for ways to monetize this shiny new digit. Does anyone know a service that pays to advertise on PR2+ blogs ?
Michael J. Austin’s last blog post… Who Gets Your Vote?
@Michael, Congrats on your PR2 upgrade. The page rank is significant in getting advertisement opportunities such as Text Link Ads or InLinks. Otherwise all that matters is the traffic. If you have decent traffic you can already monetize with private ad sales. Otherwise, I would recommend to go with non-intrusive ad types such as Google AdSense.
I can’t get it to check more then the home page.
Dennis Edell’s last blog post… Do You Have Blank Blog Advertisement Slots?
@Dennis, import your sitemap into the tool as mentioned in the post… It works like a charm!