Google PR is happening

Googlite explains PageRank tweak | The Register

Good resource:

Google has confirmed that the recent update to its "visible PageRank" system is an effort to crackdown on sites trying to rig this closely-watched web popularity contest.


Over the weekend, Google search engine guru Matt Cutts told Search Engine Journal that the company is intent on punishing web publishers that attempt to sell their PageRank currency to other sites.


A site with a high PageRank can often boost the rank of a less-popular site simply by linking to it. As a result, popular sites will often provide such links in exchange for cash. And Google doesn't like that.


Here's the word from Cutts:

The partial update to visible PageRank that went out a few days ago was primarily regarding PageRank selling and the forward links of sites. So paid links that pass PageRank would affect our opinion of a site.
Going forward, I expect that Google will be looking at additional sites that appear to be buying or selling PageRank.

As Cutts says, Google has changed its visible PageRank values - the scores that pop up on the Google Toolbar when users visit a site. This is merely an approximation of a site's "real" PageRank, which is actively used to sort search results.

Important note about why fluctuations occur:

"Values in the Google Toolbar can fluctuate for a number of normal reasons, including changes in how we crawl or index the web, or changes in the link structure of the web itself. In addition, Google may update the visible PageRank indicator in the Google Toolbar to incorporate not only our view on the back links to a page or site, but also to incorporate our opinion of the forward links for a site."

I've dropped from PR6 to PR5, I've no 'paid' links but was listed on a few directories that offered it. (my 6 ranking frequently got me on free)

Apparently (I don't know if it's true) Google are also seeking to diminish the effect of linkbacks from blogs and forums.

Impact of this Google Update:

• Linking buying and selling puts you at RISK of loosing positioning with Google.
• Building natural, non-paid, incoming links is more important than ever. Our LinkBack system can help with that.
• Ensure that your outbound links are relevant. Certainly outbound links to sites that are NOT relevant to your forum theme put you at greater risk.
• Pure whitehat SEO is even more important than ever, as manipulation techniques are beginning to get thwarted.

IF you haven't being participating in these manipulation techniques, the good news is that you stand in an excellent position to gain improved rankings, while penalized sites begin to slide down the rankings.

Originally Posted by sdebank

I've dropped from PR6 to PR5, I've no 'paid' links but was listed on a few directories that offered it. (my 6 ranking frequently got me on free)

Yes. Penalized sites will lose PageRank that was previously being passed to your site. Fortunately, everyone with these types of links will be impacted similarly, leveling the playing field.

Originally Posted by sdebank

Apparently (I don't know if it's true) Google are also seeking to diminish the effect of linkbacks from blogs and forums.

Forums and blogs are some of the best sources for authoritative linkbacks. Unfortunately, they are also victim to spamming.

I'm sure that Google's approach will be to attempt to make a differentiation.

Remember, spammers quite often do not care much about the relevancy of where they get their link. Others do, but do not measure how many links they create.

So there will be capabilities for Google to penalize specific sites, without completely devaluating forum and blog links (which would be a bad idea in general).

In general, forum admins should:

• Keep gratuitous link posting out of their forums. If the user is not posting something related to your forum, moderate it.
• Consider options such as our conditional signatures plugin.
• Do not accept LinkBacks from non-relevant sites. Delete them.

What do you guys mean by "selling" and "buying" links exactly? I just do not get it that part at all.

Originally Posted by Joe Ward

Yes. Penalized sites will lose PageRank that was previously being passed to your site. Fortunately, everyone with these types of links will be impacted similarly, leveling the playing field.

Being cynical, you don't think part of Google's motive may be to drive people to Adsense 'paid' links.

Originally Posted by Snake

What do you guys mean by "selling" and "buying" links exactly? I just do not get it that part at all.

There are (previously) high PR web directories that will link to your site in exchange for payment. Google rightly views this as falsely inflating your PR and are attempting to negate the effect of paid links.

I suspect some genuine reciprocal linking may also be affected as a consequence.

Originally Posted by Snake

What do you guys mean by "selling" and "buying" links exactly? I just do not get it that part at all.

Selling: You can charge a monthly fee to post a link to someone else's site from one or more of your site pages.

Buying: You purchase a link from a seller (as above) or from a linkfarm, or link broker, etc.

Originally Posted by sdebank

Being cynical, you don't think part of Google's motive may be to drive people to Adsense 'paid' links.

Anything's possible, but I think Larry and Sergey are more purist than that - and still have enough control to assert themselves.

Granted, as websites have a more difficult time manipulating search results, they will have a stronger tendency to spend more in CPC advertising placements (AdWords, or otherwise). This will certainly be a side-effect of the update, and a positive one for the Google finance team.

Overall, one would think that more accurate search results, deliver a higher clickthrough rates on advertising.

Higher clickthrough rates increase competition for terms, thereby raising the average CPC (cost per click) charged to advertisers.

Having a more (or the most) accurate search engine secures the largest user base, thereby harnessing more eyeballs to clickthrough on advertising.

So simply improving search relevancy can be achieved while also securing more CPC ad revenue.

Only Google would know the precise consumer behavior, and how it will impact search usage and ad spending, etc.

But it can certainly be argued that there is reason to want to improve search accuracy, rather than just force webmasters to buy online ads as the primary goal.

YES

Google really likes my site.

I jumped from PR3 to PR5 at this update at both my parents and patients forum.
NICE

Also my Asthma Blog jumped from N/A to PR4.

Can you see the BIG SMILE on my face?

I just got a PR update from 0 to 3.

Originally Posted by briansol

i dropped from 5 to 3.... and no traffic changes from goodle. PR is BS

Yeah I think I'll have to agree. It's not important to me anymore, I'm just looking at analytics (traffic) and number of indexed pages now. Those are more important anyway.

Another funny thing is a competitor of ours has pr 5 and has about 5% of the traffic we have with our pr4. Sometimes they rank higher , but because we have more content we're winning.

I just got a PR update from 1 to 3

thank you google !!!

So the PR update is still happening, huh? When is it gonna end, I wonder?