As the link selling business is getting more profitable, I have noticed a ridiculous trend among website owners. No longer are people buying links and ad spots for pure traffic, at least most aren't. It's now turning into the power of the backlink and it's pagerank. Checked the Link Sales area and 18 of 30 (60%) Threads on the first page state in the Title the PR of Links they are selling. Expired PR6 domains are going for upwards of $xxxx and the buyer sometimes has no idea that unless they maintain the backlinks, that domain will be worthless the next update. PR is blinding some buyers and sellers are cashing in... It's now some kind of high if we manage to get a PR above 5 (sadly) What happens if Google throws out pagerank and starts a formula of rank for websites (like seomoz.org page strength)? It may be good for business, but is it really good for the development of the internet for quality sites with traffic? What do you think? I'd like to know your thoughts.
i agree, i got for traffic, and page strength... in b/w i get pr links to get indexed fast in the search engine ... but my try is to get the targetted visitors because thats the only way my sites are gonna make some profit
As a directory owner i and many others would probably just sell the directories as they would be worthless to me and others if we cant make money off it. You are correct about the difference between Traffic and rank, in the sence that if your site offers me 1 million visiters or PR6-7 ill take the PR unlessyour traffic will have an impact on my sells ratio, which would then be good if the site is webmaster related,due to the fact that i would make money from your visiters. just my view and under the circumstances is all. thx malcolm
'Tis a sad but true story. But then again, when PR seems to affect SERPs so much, whats wrong with trying to improve it?
Trying to improve it? It seems like in the last year, google has put PR updates on the backburner as we have had some fluke updates and some DC's are still not completely updated. It would make it interesting if the toolbar updates were monthly, instead of almost quarterly.... Each update, people are ecstatic or let down because of a little green bar.... It's almost scary to think someone would actually take their life because of that (I know that's pretty far fetched but it could happen)
I think Google is more concerned about its adsense business than the page rank as it is clear now that Google has pushed PR update by some days I think it will take place only 3 times here from now onwards
Actually, Content is king and with seo and other things including content you get page rank. hehe Content=king page rank=queen
You mean, content with links is king? Content alone can't bring you pagerank... Also, just imagine if google began altering the way websites were valued....would the market switch instantly? or do you think PR is a definite part of the future of this text link business..
I think that Google has made it very clear in the past (via Matt Cutts mostly) that PR is only one of the many variables used to evaluate how worthy a website is. In other words, webmasters and online marketers make a bigger deal of PR than Google. I often wonder if the reason that Google continues to export the PR values is to keep us sidetracked from how they really rank sites so that people don't game the system (even more so that is.) Just my thoughts!
Here's a question: Do you think people would have been as generous if they knew they wouldn't be getting a PR9 Link for donating to W3C? Or was that never a thought in their mind when emptying $1000+ out of their pocket..
I just did an analysis with a link popularity tool for one of the websites listed on the W3 Supporters page and it was counted as a backlink. There is no "no follow" attributes on the links themselves, but there is a robot tag - index, no follow for the actual page..
Well my first comments are Thanks for opening a quality Thread I am going to read through all the posts and get back here soon But you are correct on the backlinks if they are not maintained the URL is Zilch
Noo doubt pr is king. It is what webmaster (some i guest) looks for (to some extend) to know if they are on the right track. Higher your pr, higher your chance to be listed and hopefully you get moretraffic.
Pagerank is king if your selling links. Traffic doesn not always follow PR. I would be happy to see PR go its merry way. PageRank to me is Pissing Range ... It is like a bunch of boyzs lined up against a fence with braggin' rights ... not good for much else other than seeling links and domains.
That i don't agree..don't you think the price is going down? pagerank is useless, but i don't mind putting it on title. I bought some high pr link to boost up my pr not for SEPR, but for selling link to the next loser who believe in PR sadly, most people here don't care about quality of internet. Look at those auto blog or site that copy content from other, it makes me sick. However, SEO is all about gaming the system the page strength is pretty easy to manipulate too..and look at the alog, it give extra point for having a .edu and .gov link... i don't count on it either.
Not necessarily. It may be getting devalued by the flooding of sales, but the business itself is very profitable as the demand is very high. If it was useless, then why are people with PR2 sites selling links making less money through link sales when they could potentially have double the targetted traffic in comparision with a PR7 site with little to no traffic? It's a seesaw that's not balanced... I believe Matt Cutt's recently blogged about the non existent extra weight given to .edu and .gov links...
It's the Link Sales area, so how can you distinguish yourself from everybody else? Pagerank is still meaningfull to a degree, so why not use it in a sales pitch?