More Page Rank Stuff

I read that google did a page rank update last weekend.  Let's see how I did.

Beginner Blogger Tips did not do so well:

Now, to be honest I don't remember if this blog was ever ranked, but I thought I got a page rank of 1 or 2.  Why zero?  I have no earthly idea.

My personal blog (kuyakevin.blogspot.com) was dropped from a 4 to a 3.

My Strength and Fitness blog has remained at 2 (it was at 3 a few months ago). 

So apparently I really stink at building my page rank and you should take all my PR advice with a grain of salt.  But the longer I blog, the less I care about it--all three of these before-mentioned blogs are doing pretty well (this blog doesn't get much traffic, but it never has). 

The Page Rank Drama Continues . . .

So I happened to check the page rank of Strongandfit.net again yesterday.  Once again they have dropped it from 3 to 2.  I've submitted another reconsideration request.

This is really weird--I just had the page rank re-instated a couple of weeks ago. 

I don't spend too much time worrying about page rank, but we'll see what happens. 

Page Rank Reconsideration Successful

A while back I wrote a post about how stats can drive a blogger crazy.   I mentioned that my page rank had been dropped from 3 to 2 over at strongandfit.net.

Here's the latest: my page rank has been reinstated.  I requested a reconsideration through my google webmaster tools account. 

I never lost sleep over this, but it's nice to have it back up--especially considering all the work I put into getting good back links.  

Google Page Rank Explained (in simple terms)

Google PageRank Explained: Page Rank and when/why it matters.



Note: I thought about calling this post "Page Rank for Dummies."  But you are not a dummy, are you? This article is a simplified, non-tech explanation for those who are new to blogging (or to the more technical aspects).  If you want more thorough explanations, there are thousands of other sites to choose from.  I’m just sharing what I’ve learned so far. 

Your page rank is one major factor in your blog’s relative importance in a search engine’s rankings. 

Does page rank matter?  It depends.  I have pages that get search engine hits despite being unranked (zero ranking).  Why?  Specific searches—if someone happens to search a specific term related to some of these pages/posts, my site is high on the list (in some search engines, my site/article maybe the only match). 

I’ll explain further.

Placing #1 in Google is pretty simple.  Just create a blog or post entitled "suicidal alien chiwawa."  Give it a couple of weeks.  Next time that term is searched, you have a good shot at being number 1.

The problem, of course, is the obscurity of the term.  Not many will do a search about your depressed, extra-terrestrial dog.

Here’s where page rank comes in: a high page rank helps you compete in search engines for more common searches.

Here’s a simple graph which visually explains page rank:*

So how do you improve your page rank?  Well, there’s a couple of things I’ve figured out so far:

1. Time: Search engines tend to "like" older sites (generally speaking).  Here’s the idea—an older site is less likely to be someone just posting a spammy ad blog.

2. Backlinks:  The more links there are to your blog, the higher your page will rank.  It also helps if your link is on high-ranking blogs.  I’ll explain more as I keep learning.

My advice:  work on building your page rank, but don’t obsess over it.  Page rank, like SEO, isn't an exact science.  It's a little bit complicated, and I run across conflicting information.

Remember, you should be thinking long-term and focusing on high quality content. 

By the way, I am trying some things to improve my page rank--I'll eventually let you know what I'm doing and if it is working.

By the way, you can check your page rank HERE.

*Graph is from http://www.smashingmagazine.com