WDTalk

In the last week, I’ve read a number of threads discussing Page Rank – most noticeably how it affects SERPS or back links.  To optimize your back links, measure the relevance of the content of the source page of that link to the content on your landing page. The more relevant, the more weight given that back link.

To determine Page Rank - which of the following are easier to grasp?

PR(A) = (1 – d) + d * SUM ((PR(I->A)/C(I))

Where:

* PR(A) is the PageRank of your page A.
* d is the damping factor, usually set to 0,85.
* PR(I->A) is the PageRank of page I containing a link to page A.
* C(I) is the number of links off page I.
* PR(I->A)/C(I) is a PR-value page A receives from page I.
* SUM (PR(I->A)/C(I)) is the sum of all PR-values page A receives from pages with links to page A..

Versus

PR is a purely mechanistic calculation of the probability of a resource being randomly requested, defined by the following expression.

 

 

where:

• p1,p2,…,pN are the pages under consideration;
• M(pi) is the set of pages that link to pi;
• L(pj) is the number of outbound links on page pj;
• d is the damping factor; and,
• N is the total number of pages.

What is your Google Analytics IQ score? Google offers a Google Analytics Individual Qualification (IQ) test to determine your score, but you might want to take their Analytics IQ lessons first. You’ll learn everything from interface navigation to event tracking and virtual pageviews.

Google offers twenty five analytics presentations – each on average lasting from five to ten minutes. While most of what is presented will be second hat to seasoned webmasters, much of Google’s analytics has been updated, for example – Campaign Tracking and AdWords Integration. Are you running AdWords? Google recently updated their Analysis Focus – AdWords.

For an in depth analysis of your sites -you may wish to view their presentations on custom reporting, advanced segmentation, motion charts, internal site search, event tracking and virtual pageviews.

Google Presentations

First Steps

• Updated: Introduction to Google Analytics:
• Interface Navigation:
• Updated: Installing the Google Analytics Tracking Code:

Interpreting Reports

• Guidelines:
• Pageviews, Visits, and Visitors:
• Time Metrics:
• Traffic Sources:
• Content Reports:

Fundamentals

• Profiles in Google Analytics:
• Updated: Campaign Tracking and AdWords Integration:
• Updated: Analysis Focus – AdWords:
• Goals in Google Analytics:
• Analysis Focus – Funnel Visualization:
• Filters in Google Analytics:
• Regex and Google Analytics:
• Cookies and Google Analytics:
• Updated: E-commerce Tracking:
• Analysis Focus – Revenue Metrics:
• Updated: Domains and Subdomains:

In-Depth Analysis

• Custom Reporting:
• Advanced Segmentation:
• Motion Charts:
• Internal Site Search:
• Updated: Event Tracking and Virtual Pageviews:
• Updated: Additional Customizations:

Last May 2010, Google updated their search results – to include an expanded left-hand navigation panel:

What’s new and what’s changed?
We’ve added contextually relevant, left-hand navigation to the page. This new side panel highlights the most relevant search tools and refinements for your query. Over the past three years, we’ve launched Universal Search, the Search Options panel and Google Squared, and it’s those three technologies that power the left-hand panel.

Universal Search helps you find the most relevant types of results for your search. The top section of the new left-hand panel builds on Universal Search by suggesting the most relevant genres of results for your query and letting you seamlessly switch to these different types of results. The “Everything” option remains our essential search experience with different types of results integrated into the main results, but now you can also easily switch to just the particular type of results you are looking for.

Our expandable Search Options panel launched last spring brought many rich slice-and-dice tools to search. The new left-hand navigation showcases these tools and enables you to get a different view of your results. Perhaps you’d like to see images from each of the results or just the newest information? These options are all on the left, and our technology will suggest the tools that are most relevant and helpful to your query.

Their slice-and-dice tools offer – a truly unique way to research your website and the products and services you offer. For example, typing in your domain and clicking on ‘Blogs’ returns every blog that mentions your domain name within their content. Want to know if you’re being tweeted about? Click on ’Realtime’ and hope the tweets fly off the page (in a good way). Selecting ‘Discussions’ returns threads about your company on forums and social media sites.

I first saw Let Me Google That For You  on a web hosting forum this morning. One of the members asked a question he clearly should have Googled first. OMG, he was flamed by the moderator with a response from www.lmgtfy.com that started a trend by others on the board.

I tried to think of some good keywords for examples, but you can use any search term you want. Click on any of the links below to see why this made me smile.

What is a Virtual Private Server?

Is the correct term bandwidth or data transfer?

What does BGP mean?

What is a favicon?

Why can’t dogs fly?

Super Bowl Champions – Saint Louis RAMS

What is Google Voice?

A very condensed version of Google Voice is that Google gives you a single phone number, based on your area code or zip code that rings to one or all of your phones, including work, home or mobile. It also saves your voicemail online and transcribes your voicemail to text.

Google Voice has a ton of cool features like the ability to listen in on messages while they’re being left, block unwanted callers and it gives you the ability to create contact groups.

You can also integrate Google Voice into your website, by embedding voicemail messages or call widgets. When using the call widget, you can select which of your phone numbers you want the call forwarded to, or simply direct those calls to voicemail. You can even customize the voicemail greetings.

The default group settings are for friends, family or co-workers, but you can create your own group name. 

For each group, you can set which phones will ring and assign a specific voicemail greeting. For example, you can adjust your settings so that when your contacts in your co-workers group call, Google Voice rings your office phone only, and those contacts hear the voicemail greeting you created for them. I see lots of possibilities here.

Want to know more? Google has an entire series of videos on YouTube covering:

What is Google Voice

Mobile Applications

Sign Up Options

Screen Callers

Conference Calls

Block Callers

Share Voicemails

SMS to Email

International Calling

Personalized Greetings

One Number

Thinking back about thirteen years now, I saw my first demonstration of FrontPage at a local ISP in the Central West End, and I was like, WOW! Todd, their webmaster, had designed and built their network from the ground floor up. At the time, I had ZERO experience building websites, and knew even less about Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

In its Infancy
Back then, optimizing websites for the major search engines was very different than it is today. Thirteen years ago, the Internet was still very much in its infancy, so manipulating the search engines to rank in the top ten wasn’t that hard. Fortunately, our webmaster understood SEO and the importance of link building, meta tags and targeted keywords. Even with a rudimentary knowledge of SEO, you could easily rank in the top ten on lots of keyword queries, but not so today.

Today’s search engine providers employ highly advanced/complex algorithms
I’ve had clients ask why their site was listed on page one weeks ago, but today wallow around on page three. Unfortunately, there’s no simple answer. A lot of webmasters are still on a crash course to add as many inbound links as they can garnish, hoping to improve their link popularity. The problem is, the search engine gurus have taken link popularity to a whole new level, and now rank links, both internally and externally. It’s nearly impossible for an average webmaster to manipulate search results today because links on other sites are beyond their control.

Enter Good and Bad Neighborhoods
Ranking links means that links are analyzed and prioritized. A site with 500 inbound links may rank higher in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPS) than one with 3000 inbound links. Why? The trend driving algorithms today is content. Links to sites that advocate spamming, illegal downloads, blackhat SEO, or those that smell of link exchange migrate to bad neighborhoods, and are penalized.

Link Wheels & Link Exchanges
It seems like at least once each week, I get asked about providing multiple IP addresses across multiple Class C’s. A Class C is an allocation of 256 IP addresses and is known as a /24. The goal seems to be to trick the search engines into believing your site is more popular that it really is. At present, Google still rules the Internet, and they’ve made it perfectly clear that they frown upon link exchanges of any kind or shape. Using IP’s from different Class C’s is simply an attempt to disguise a link exchange.

Not all meta tags are recognized by Google, including keywords
Once upon a time, when Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave to the poor, the ratio of targeted keywords to their inclusion in the content of a site was very important. I used to advocate that myself, but I’m old – times change. So if link wheels, link exchanges and targeted keywords are not the answer, what is?

My Thoughts
What are the major search engines attempting to do? The answer, taking note of Bing’s own advertisements, is returning results – relevant results. The most valuable inbound links are organic – those that are acquired via compelling content that addresses pain and offers solutions. Why does anyone use Google, Yahoo, Bing or any search engine? They’re searching for information relevant to some pain, need or desire. It bears repeating over and over that content is KING.

If content is king, how do you get to wear that crown?
One Tip: You can write articles in the form of advice based on your experience. If your advice is of value AND there are sufficient people searching out answers related to your content, Google will take notice. This can be accomplished via corporate blogs, forums, micro sites, and/or article directories. The more Google indexes your content, the more targeted visitors it will send your direction. Increased traffic often leads to external publication of your articles. The key here is to provide a bio with each article that leads back to your website with targeted keywords as the anchor text. An example: Instead of writing, “Click Here,” hyperlink a targeted keyword phrase like, “Business Class Shared Web Hosting.” One word of caution, or advice – you need not go overboard in submitting articles to dozens of article directories. Select those with good Alexa traffic and high external PageRank. Quality is key.

Does PageRank matter? More than a few self proclaimed SEO experts say NO, but common sense dictates that it does, even though some low PageRank (PR) sites with just the correct combination of keywords outperform higher PR sites in Search Engine Results Pages (SERPS). When we externally compare sites for PageRank, we’re comparing Toolbar PageRank which doesn’t necessarily match Google’s internal page rank.

Toolbar PageRank versus Real Page Rank
What’s reflected on Google’s Tool Bar is a simple indicator for some of Google’s vast tool chest of variables that determine real page rank. The two may be very different. It’s believed that Google looks at over 200 key indicators, and the combination of those determine real page rank. Toolbar PageRank is believed to be a numeric value of link juice, or the measurement of indexed links to your site.

Inbound links from higher PR sites that have related content lend higher value than those with higher PR with non-related content or lots of links to bad neighborhoods. Changes in PR do not always affect changes in SERPS. Toolbar PageRank is essentially an algorithm to quantify the authority of a site, and the assigned numerical number (0-10) cannot be increased without increasing backlinks.

How do you determine your site’s value to the search engines?
One of the things I look for is how often search engines spider pages, but that’s just a starting point. If you’re running a popular forum or blog, content on your site is being constantly updated, and the search engines sit up and take note of this. If you’re using Google Alerts, it’s not uncommon to see threads indexed in less than five minutes.

Another way is to analyze traffic to your site, researching the keywords, keyword phrases and extended keyword phrases being entered in search queries and on what pages they land.

Are all search engines equal?
The answer here is absolutely NOT. Although they all factor in backlinks, Yahoo, for instance seems to factor out low page rank sites. Google, on the other hand, clearly seems to use a variety of different algorithms to rank sites. As a test, do a search on both search engines for the same query, then take a look at the descending order of PageRank in the SERPS for each.

The Value of Niche Marketing
Here’s where it gets interesting. The more niche the search query is, the greater the probability that lower PR pages may outperform higher PR pages. And vice versa – the more generic the query, the greater the probability higher PR pages may outperform lower PR pages. An example, a query for the niche – Business Class Shared Web Hosting, may rank in the top ten in Google SERPS, with a corresponding PageRank of 4. A search query for Hosting will likely return higher PR sites in the top ten.

My Recommendation
Don’t become overly absorbed by the Toolbar PageRank of your site. While it is certainly an indicator of link juice, it’s not an accurate indicator of SERPS value, and that’s what really matters. Will prospects entering search queries relevant to your products or services find your site on the first page of results in Google, Bing or Yahoo? If not, it doesn’t matter if your PageRank is 10. If they can’t find your site within minutes of entering that search query, you’ll be like that airport they build near me years ago that no one ever used, yet the bus lines kept driving routes by it – nice facility, but no revenue. Instead of investing in PageRank, invest in providing value to your visitors. Your SERPS will improve and so will your bottom line.