Since there seems to always be a large buzz here at DP when it comes to PR updates, I have decided to publish this thread which deals with some of the most frequently asked questions regarding PR. What is Page Rank anyway? Page Rank is a number from 0 to 10 which basically tells you how much Google values your website. The larger your PR, the more Google thinks of your website. How is PR calculated? Basically, PR reflects both the quantity and quality of links to your site. The higher the PR of the page the link comes from, the more it will help. The more external links on a certain page, the less PR it is likely to pass. Wait a minute there, isn't PR a value which represents an entire website? No, it is not. Each page on your website has its own PR, based on the number of links pointing to that certain page. Just because your homepage has a PR of 6 doesn't mean that every page will have the same PR. How can PR be increased and how long will it take? It depends on the PR you wish to achieve. If you have just registered your domain and published your website, then achieving a PR1 or a PR2 will not be that difficult.The higher your goals, the more work it will take. It is far more difficult to bring your website from a PR5 to a PR6 than it is to achieve a PR3 from scratch, for example. How can you know what your PR is? You can use the google toolbar or simply perform a google search and you will find a lot of resources you can use in order to determine the PR for certain pages. Are relevant links more important than others? Simple logic tells you that a link coming from a website with a similar topic is far more important than links coming from websites which have nothing to do with your theme. If your website is about cars, then links from other resources about cars are the ones Google will value the most. Will a new link impact my website right away? Of course not. It will take time for google to know that a new website has linked to you and to take that link into consideration accordingly. What kind of websites should I link to? PR should not be the main thing you take into consideration when linking to other website. If you find a certain resource to be useful, then, by all means, link to it. Will my PR leak as a result of outgoing links? This is a topic which has created quite a buzz. While there are people who think that linking to other websites will have PR leaks as a result, there are others who think that outgoing links can even be beneficial. Is PR the most important factor which determines search engine positions? Not by a long shot. PR is just one of the factors which are taken into consideration, and it is definitely not the most important one. No, a high PR does not necessarily result in better search engine positions. Is PR less important compared to how it used to be? Yes, over the years, PR has become less and less important. Chasing PR does not have to be your main concern unless you are planning to sell links. Should you base your external linking on PR? Certainly not. Instead, link to resources which are actually worth it and resources your visitors may find useful. PR is definitely not the most important thing when it comes to your linking campaign. Quantity or quality? This is an interesting issue, as many people find themselves in a situation where they have to choose between one PR7 link, for example, and a few PR6 links. Putting all of your eggs in one basket is something you do not want to do when it comes to this issue. You do not want to have to rely on a single link. In other words, your PR7 link may easily drop to a PR 6 and ruin your plans. You do not want to have an unpleasant surprise like this one spoil things for you. The odds of the PR 6 links reaching PR7 are also higher compared to the odds of a PR7 link reaching a PR8, that is another reason for which diversification can be beneficial. How can a high PR be monetized? Two words: selling links All in all, is going after a high PR worth it? As stated above, it can be if you are interested in selling links. In general, there are far more important things you should be interested in. If you do your job right, then PR will come as a natural result, but you should definitely not make achieving a high PR a purpose in itself. Hope it helps, F1RM
It basically contains the things everyone should know. You would be surprised as to how many webmasters still think that PR= good rankings F1RM
Thank you for your comment If anyone would like to contribute with additional comments newbies may find useful, opinions are both welcome and appreciated. F1RM
Hi firm, Fantastic information about PR, it’s really useful to every SEO users who are search hunt for PR and increase traffic for every websites. Realistic job is you have brought up the points in question genre. You are truly appreciated for nice information.
Most of your other points are ok....PR does not take into account the quality of your links. you can get links from unrelated sites and they will increase your PR but won't impact your serps..
No, he was right to include the term 'quality' because PageRank is about more than simply the quantity of links. The overall calculation of PageRank is based on measuring the PageRank strength of each link, which was the quality metric at issue - not the relevance of the links.
As rainborick has stated, I was referring to quality as far as PR is concerned, not relevance. The relevance of links was mentioned here: The above quote refers to links in general, and, of course, relevant links are always more important for SEO than others. In other words, quality means PageRank strength when it comes to obtaining a higher PR and quality mostly means relevance when it comes to obtaining better search engine positions. Your input is appreciated and other opinions and comments are more than welcome. Best regards, F1RM
I would like to thank the ones who have sent positive rep as a result of this thread. It's nice to know that you appreciate the content I have written. Once again, thank you and feel free to contribute with comments, ideas or suggestions to this thread. Best regards, F1RM
How linking to other websites can be beneficial aside from the revenue generating aspect? For example, if you own a blog and provide a link to certain blog posts which you consider useful, then it is likely that the blogger(s) in question will return the gesture at a certain point and link back to you. Aside from that, there is that occasional resource you just have to link to. If a certain website has information that can be very useful to your visitors, then suggesting that resource may be beneficial in the long run. Some might argue that you don't want to drive visitors away from your website in the first place, but linking to quality resources will show them that you have their best interest in mind and may just create the foundation for a bond between you and the visitors. The bottom line is that, if a resource (be it a blog post or an entire website) is worth it, then you should not be afraid to link to it. Just my 2 cents, F1RM
A bit anal, but why did you put Page Rank in the first question instead of PageRank? Nice work, great resource for beginners.
You should have added in the end that " not to open a thread on DP asking about the PR update " .jokes apart. A nicely compiled post.Much Appreciated