Feb 23 2011
New Google PageRank Algorithm Debunked
In my recent article on SEJ about Google PageRank I suggested that a new formula could be in action. The article has gone big on Twitter and LinkedIn, with hundreds of shares. And from some comments, it looks like many people accepted it for a fact.
Now I hate to break it but I have to admit that I was most probably wrong. So I need to write this follow-up article to prevent yet another SEO myth from spreading. Let me explain what happened:
- I saw an unreasonably low toolbar PageRank value for my blog after the last update;
- I started looking around for possible reasons;
- I noticed many people observed similar effects;
- I found an article by Bill Slawski about Google’s Reasonable Surfer model, which seemed to explain my observations and other people’s rankings well;
- I decided to share my findings for consideration and discussion.
And the discussion followed! My article collected about 100 comments, and a few SEO experts came up to correct me. The problem is, too many people accepted the alleged news without doubt and spread it further, so now it is my responsibility to get things straight.
So what was the real cause of poor ratings?
Special thanks to Donna Fontenot for providing the most likely explanation for the effect that I and other webmasters observed. The toolbar PageRank value is known to lag substantially even after an update. Matt Cutts mentioned it in his blog post about what is a Google update.
Please note the difference between the toolbar PageRank (TBPR) and Google’s internal PR value used as one of their 200+ factors to rank pages. I should have made this distinction more clear in my original article, too. Toolbar PageRank is more or less useless today because of how rarely it gets updated, and how much it lags. You can safely ignore it. If you are good with your link building, you will notice that from improvements in your search rankings first, and toolbar PageRank value will catch up eventually.
This devaluation of toolbar PageRank even makes quite a few people declare that “PageRank is dead”. This includes some industry experts. Be careful when listening to these proclamations. Those people know what they are talking about, but they are referring to toolbar PageRank value, not the Google’s internal formula. Internal PR is still a significant ranking factor, albeit only one of the hundreds.
And what about the Reasonable Surfer model?
I based my previous explanation of poor TBPR ratings after the recent update on Google’s Reasonable Surfer patent. But the thing is, a patent does not equal implementation! Google has hundreds of patents. They even seem to have a weight loss related patent. This does not mean they are secretly crafting weight loss into their ranking algorithm.
On one hand, some parts of the Reasonable Surfer model could have been tested by Google even before they filed the patent (and that was in 2004). On the other hand, some parts of it may still not be implemented, either because of engineering difficulties, or because of too much noise in the suggested signals. I don’t know the current status of this model’s implementation, and I’m afraid Google will not disclose it.
I, for one, would welcome the change if they crafted this model directly into the PR and TBPR formula. That would make the link building efforts of those webmasters who are focused on TBPR more productive. It’s an easily observable single indicator, and it is often used for bragging and comparison, so it would be nice if it correlated more with the true quality of the page’s link profile.
In any case, it is worth your time to learn about this model, because it has a good chance to influence your rankings one way or another, now or in future. Just don’t take this for a hard fact. Here is one more good article about this model: The reasonable surfer; makes for unreasonable thinkers.
What practical conclusions you can make from this?
Number one conclusion is: do not trust everything you read. If someone publishes an article on a reputable site, that does not make him an expert. If someone is an expert, that does not mean he is always right. And even if someone is right, that does not mean the same applies to your situation. Be especially careful about trusting any anecdotal evidence. Double-check any information you plan to apply to your business or communicate to your customers.
Next, while the Reasonable Surfer model may not be fully implemented yet, the work performed in that direction indicates that search engines are not happy with simple mechanical ratings, and want their rankings to match the human behavior closer. While for now you may still enjoy some results from link spam, rest assured that search engines will be fighting to make it obsolete. So do not make your business or your customers depend on cheap links entirely.
One more reminder: don’t pay much if any attention to toolbar PageRank values. If you want to brag about your site, talk about unique visitors and conversion rate. If you want to find influential online partners, ask them about the same. That green bar just doesn’t mean too much today.
And finally, if you write an article about a high-impact subject like PageRank, make all the necessary terminology distinctions very clearly, and consult real experts in the field before publishing, even if you have years of relevant business experience under your own belt.
Credits
Thanks to Barry Adams for raising an alarm about my previous article in a way that no-one could ignore. Thanks to David Harry for dissecting it at SEOBS and for reviewing this follow-up (Editor’s note: the link to SEOB post was added by Ann. Cheers, Dave!). Thanks to all the readers for your support and understanding!
If you retweeted or otherwise shared my previous article, please share this one, too. Don’t let yet another SEO myth spread over the Internet. In fact, share it anyway, it will not hurt. Thank you!
Written By:
Val Danylchuk | Web Tracking | @webtrackingblog
Val Danylchuk is the author of Web Tracking Guide – an easy, step-by-step tutorial on tracking and maximizing your online profits.
More Posts By Val Danylchuk
Sometimes that ToolBar PageRank lag is a couple years.
I have an enormous amount of respect for you and the way you’ve handled the criticism. Huge props to you for that.
@Val….Barry surely helped in all of this…I’d send him a Timmys – Dbl/Dbl of course!
🙂
Jim
I agree with Donna. Well done, Val.
I agree with dazzlindonna too.
When you guest post especially on such a famous blog you reach to a wider audience one has to be prepared for the bouquets as well as the brickbats.
I like your conclusion:
If someone publishes an article on a reputable site, that does not make him an expert. If someone is an expert, that does not mean he is always right. And even if someone is right, that does not mean the same applies to your situation.Well said and well managed .That’s the spirit. Huge props to you for that and kudos to SEJ for giving you the opportunity for this post.
Excellent – I respect you for being honest and open.
Hi Val,
Regarding the Reasonable Surfer Model, we have had a number of statements from people at Google that not every link on a page carries the same weight, and that PageRank itself has transformed in many ways over the years since it was first introduced. Reasonable Surfer Model? Who knows?
What intriqued me about the patent when I first read it and wrote about it was that it provided an intricate approach that a machine could use to make decisions about how much weight each link might pass along, and gave us some insight into the assumptions behind those decisions. Many of them made a lot of sense. For instance, a link with text the same color as the background it appears upon probably doesn’t pass along much PageRank at all.
But, writing about search patents is a little like walking in a field filled with landmines. It’s really helpful to keep in mind that what your writing about may come to pass, or may already be in place, or may be implemented but transformed in many ways, some of those with some serious implications, or it might never see the light of day. Some patents that impact user interfaces are easier to see when implemented, while others that involved mostly algorithmic changes are much harder to recognize. (One of the words that appears in my Webmaster Tools list as a major keyword for my site is “may,” and another is “might,” – you can see how often I used them in the previous sentence alone.
A number of Google’s patents have provided me with actionable steps that I could follow that made a big difference in how well pages ranked in certain areas, especially when it comes to local search. Many end up providing questions and ideas to be tested, poked, prodded, and experimented with. Most provide a view of search, search engines, and searchers from the perspective of people working at search engines.
What I want to say to you is don’t be afraid to write about what you’ve found, and share your views, even if sometimes it seems like people are grabbing torches and coming after you as if you were Frankenstein’s monster. But also, don’t take something that you’ve read in a place like a Google patent, and take it as proof that the search engine is doing something. Take it as a possibility, and use it as a springboard to explore what they’ve actually come up with. As a primary source, directly from the search engine, it’s often better information that anecdotal information spread from one SEO to another, and transformed in the process often into nothing resembling the original tidbit of information.
You’ve handled the criticism that people raised against your original post very well. I hope that you do keep writing, and questioning, and raising points for people to respond to, even if it’s with criticism. The discourse is what helps us all grow.
Hi Val,
Regarding the Reasonable Surfer Model, we have had a number of statements from people at Google that not every link on a page carries the same weight, and that PageRank itself has transformed in many ways over the years since it was first introduced. Reasonable Surfer Model? Who knows?
What intriqued me about the patent when I first read it and wrote about it was that it provided an intricate approach that a machine could use to make decisions about how much weight each link might pass along, and gave us some insight into the assumptions behind those decisions. Many of them made a lot of sense. For instance, a link with text the same color as the background it appears upon probably doesn’t pass along much PageRank at all.
But, writing about search patents is a little like walking in a field filled with landmines. It’s really helpful to keep in mind that what your writing about may come to pass, or may already be in place, or may be implemented but transformed in many ways, some of those with some serious implications, or it might never see the light of day. Some patents that impact user interfaces are easier to see when implemented, while others that involved mostly algorithmic changes are much harder to recognize. (One of the words that appears in my Webmaster Tools list as a major keyword for my site is “may,” and another is “might,” – you can see how often I used them in the previous sentence alone.
A number of Google’s patents have provided me with actionable steps that I could follow that made a big difference in how well pages ranked in certain areas, especially when it comes to local search. Many end up providing questions and ideas to be tested, poked, prodded, and experimented with. Most provide a view of search, search engines, and searchers from the perspective of people working at search engines.
What I want to say to you is don’t be afraid to write about what you’ve found, and share your views, even if sometimes it seems like people are grabbing torches and coming after you as if you were Frankenstein’s monster. But also, don’t take something that you’ve read in a place like a Google patent, and take it as proof that the search engine is doing something. Take it as a possibility, and use it as a springboard to explore what they’ve actually come up with. As a primary source, directly from the search engine, it’s often better information that anecdotal information spread from one SEO to another, and transformed in the process often into nothing resembling the original tidbit of information.
You’ve handled the criticism that people raised against your original post very well. I hope that you do keep writing, and questioning, and raising points for people to respond to, even if it’s with criticism. The discourse is what helps us all grow.
Oh many thanks for the information! I started SEO but this is just the time that I knew about this! Thanks a lot for the new information.
Good for you coming out with this backtrack, but the trouble is that in the SEO industry there are too many people attempting to be chiefs – over-anlayzing every minute detail, attempting to garner interest in their own expertise, get links to sites, blogs, create linkbait and (sometimes intentional controversy), all to jockey themselves into positions of authority for the good of their business and websites.
I’m am in no way saying there aren’t enough indians – but rather that 90% of what is put out there as original material by SEO’s when writing about SEO is regurgitated whether it be right or wrong.
As you’ve rightly pointed out – make judgements for yourself based upon reasonable observation and supporting evidence, and learn to separate what does work from the plethora of nonsense.
A couple of products have cropped up claiming to actively predict a websites future PR – before the update.
Respect!
Kudos. Not everyone has the “bells” in admitting when something went out that was not totally 100% accurate. Fact is, it is never really 100% accurate as proven many times over. However, you invoke very important things here that is worth a lot – (practical conclusions)… Thumbs up
Kudos. Not everyone has the “bells” in admitting when something went out that was not totally 100% accurate. Fact is, it is never really 100% accurate as proven many times over. However, you invoke very important things here that is worth a lot – (practical conclusions)… Thumbs up
Val, I’ll add my respects to the pile. You stepped in it, but you’ve cleaned off your boots, and moved on, wiser for the experience. Well handled recovery!
Val lots of respect for you! DiTesco is right not everyone have the “bells” to admit specially when things get out of control.
The great part is you seriously respect the image of guest blogging and also shows others the way on how to handle the situation when things go worst.
Hi Bill,
Thank you for taking the time to explain your view on this in such detail. I’m also pleased to hear your words of support.
I think it is actually the biggest strength of the social media, that you can hear the feedback immediately, discuss and learn together. So I always welcome criticism, especially when it is well grounded and constructive.
Seriously great follow up Val. Awesome article.
Hi Donna,
Thank you again for suggesting the most likely explanation, and also for being friendly, constructive, willing to explain things and provide references.
Thank you, Moosa,
Yes, there is probably something to learn from this situation for those interested in guest blogging.
Thanks, Doc,
I like how you put it. You’ve got style!
Thank you,
I think it makes sense to post an update when you learn more about the subject. Even more so if you had it wrong. And you are right, SEO knowledge is often hard to test, so it’s hard for anyone to be accurate 100% of the time. That’s why I believe we should be very open about our new findings, evidence and mistakes.
Thank you!
That’s interesting. They could actually provide some useful data, I just hope they don’t over-hype it and claim to be some sort of prophets. Honest analysis based on available knowledge with full disclosure of calculations could be useful to someone who has enough time/budget to research that.
I think it’s okay for some writing to be regurgitated as long as it’s reasonably accurate. There are always more people to reach who might have not learned about the particular facts yet.
Still, your point is very valid. There are dozens of myths about online business and SEO which are floating around only because they have been repeated many times before.
You should always test and verify any new ideas you apply to your business, as much as possible.
Thank you!
Thanks for your support!
Thank you!
Hi Jim,
You also played your part in this. Thanks for your opinion!
This sometimes looks a little irresponsible on Google’s part. Of course they can’t guarantee fresh and accurate rankings for everyone all the time. But in this case, TBPR is more often useless than not. If they make it available and so highly visible, they should really keep it up to date better.
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