PageRank: The decreasing importance of Google PageRank to your web site

PageRank is a system that helps Google to organize its search result pages. It used to be the heart of Google's ranking algorithms. Google explains PageRank as follows:

"PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page's value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves 'important' weigh more heavily and help to make other pages 'important.'

Important, high-quality sites receive a higher PageRank, which Google remembers each time it conducts a search. [...]"

The PageRank of a web site is displayed in a little green bar in the Google toolbar. The wider the green bar, the higher the PageRank of a web page. Every page of a web site has its own PageRank.

Why all the hype?

PageRank used to be so important that many webmasters only concentrated on getting a high PageRank without caring about other important aspects of their web site.

Even today, many webmasters only want to link to web sites with a high PageRank and some webmasters even accept only links from web sites that have a high PageRank.

However, a high PageRank does not mean much to your business. It's basically only a green line in a search engine toolbar that has little effect on your web site rankings. It doesn't mean that you'll get more visitors and it also doesn't mean that your web site is useful to your web site visitors.

You can have top 10 Google rankings with a low PageRank

To prove this statement, here are some examples of search terms that return web pages with a low PageRank in Google's top 10 results:

Search term	Google search results and page rank of that page
	#1	#2	#3	#4	#5	#6	#7	#8	#9	#10
wonderbra	PR4	PR0	PR4	PR4	PR4	PR4	PR4	PR3	PR5	PR5
sneakers	PR5	PR5	PR5	PR0	PR5	PR5	PR6	PR3	PR5	PR5
grill equipment	PR1	PR0	PR3	PR0	PR3	PR0	PR0	PR1	PR4	PR5
life vest	PR4	PR4	PR5	PR0	PR4	PR4	PR0	PR4	PR4	PR4
buy Post It notes	PR5	PR3	PR3	PR4	PR3	PR2	PR3	PR3	PR0	PR1
buy a new office chair	PR3	PR3	PR0	PR0	PR4	PR4	PR0	PR0	PR6	PR4

Example: The Google results on position 3, 4, 7 and 8 for the search term "buy a new office chair" have a PageRank of 0. The top ranked page for "grill equipment" has a PageRank of 1. (As of 7 June 2004, PageRank values often change)

As you can see, it is possible to get a top 10 ranking on Google even if you have a PageRank of 0. In addition, you can see that the search results are not sorted by PageRank.

Did Google drop the PageRank concept?

Rumor has it that Google does not rely on PageRank anymore because it doesn't own the rights for it. Actually, the PageRank patent is granted to Stanford University.

If Google continued to rely on PageRank, Stanford might get a large amount of the profit when Google goes public. For that reason, Google might have dropped the PageRank concept with its IPO plans. This is only speculation but it doesn't sound too incongruous. At least it seems that PageRank is now less important than it has been before.

What does this mean to you and your web site?

Don't care too much about Google PageRank. A high PageRank is nothing more than a line of green pixels in the Google toolbar. It doesn't mean that you'll get better search engine rankings and it doesn't mean that you'll get more visitors.

If you want a successful web site, then build a useful web site for your visitors. While the PageRank number seems to become less important, links to your web site are still an important factor for high Google rankings. Get links from other web sites that are related to your site and provide links to other web sites that are useful to your visitors. That linking strategy will not only bring you targeted visitors from other sites, it will also result in a higher PageRank for your web site if that is important to you.

In addition, optimize your web page content so that it makes sense to both your visitors and search engines. As explained in previous issues of our newsletter, optimized web pages get better search engine rankings than unoptimized pages.

A web site with useful content, good design and good incoming links will bring you the best results. You'll get high rankings on search engines and - even more important - more customers and more sales.