I've been doing this for quite some time now and what I've learnt is pretty simple. Once I complete a site I just let it be. It has worked considerably well for me in most cases.
Because Google has not updated it's own page to say PageRank is not important anymore. http://www.google.com/corporate/tech.html If Google says its important, well then, I guess it might be just a little important.
as much as people around here say pr means nothing i disagree, sure pr alone will not get you #1 spot as if it did then google would not be a good search engine, example a site with keywords "mortgage broker" somewere in its description and a pagerank of 8 will most likely not be listed higher then a site with pagerank 2 that is optimized for the same keyword... you hear alot of "well your pagerank increased today did your serp increase also?" well remember just because the tool bar updated say today doesnt mean you went from pagerank 0 to 4 overnight so even though yesterday your site had pr0 on the tool bar to google you were a pr4 site. what about "backlinks are important pr is not" well dont backlinks=PR? even if its 0 pr with some backlinks pointing to you id think your pr0 is better then the pr0 of a site with no backlinks. search google for keywords that have say 10 million results, do you see a webpage with pr0 on the top? sometimes you might find one or 2 but remember at the same time you are probably looking at toolbar page rank wich may change at any time.
a search for mortgage broker = almost 7 million results, clicked the top 50, everything listed through the top 50 had decent PR, there where 0 sites with PR of 0 listed, 3 pages with grey toolbar but after checking the backlinks to those 3 pages they are definetly not pr0 to google. so if pr means nothing how come no one with pr0 is anywhere to be found on the top 50?
google was made for such questions Bradford a backlink is when another site links to yours. hopefully via the anchor text you want Pr is still useful says google. "PageRank Technology: PageRank reflects our view of the importance of web pages by considering more than 500 million variables and 2 billion terms. Pages that we believe are important pages receive a higher PageRank and are more likely to appear at the top of the search results." http://www.google.com/corporate/tech.html Until google say its not, it is. Just like how people say meta keywording is dead. When amazon stops keywording ill stop keywording. Lastly: for people who talk about ranking high for w/e words and thier sites are pr 0, im guessing you either have a market thats been stagnative for ages and no updates, your a new site in which google rates you higher becuase it likes new content or you do what i do.... make content king on your site and not just searching for PR, however content = PR and so do backlinks.... chicken or the egg kind of question, but as far as im going, google says its important so it is.
It'd be interesting to see how green my rep bar would be if I had a genuine PR10 site. I've seen a site with PR7 rank absolutely nowhere for major keywords it was evidently trying to rank for. In that perspective, PR 'means nothing'. However, Matt Cutts himself has said as recently as late 2007 that PR does influence rankings. I'll dig the post out if required.
PR doesn't influnce the SERPS, but it let you know that you have links on some important websites (which have PR also). Those links can improve your SERPS, indeed. But not that green bar from Google Toolbar
Also ive actuly been rejected free one way links from sites within my niches becuase of low PR so that says somthing lol.
There's no need to dig it out. Google sums up the value of pagerank at the link below. http://www.google.com/corporate/tech.html The majority of people that say pagerank means nothing are uninformed or oblivious to offpage SEO. Granted, PR is not everything. But Google states those sites with higher PR will likely be seen at the top of the search results. Now who does not want to be at the top of Google's search results? lol
pr is and will be important forever. maybe google will stop telling our site's pr but it will be always important. but it is not the most important thing. for example, the visiters time on site is most important than pr.