Lower PageRank: Not as big a Problem as You Think

Marjory Meechan - November 12, 2007

Lower PageRank has been a hot topic in SEO forums and blogs over the last couple of weeks. Many highly regarded sites experienced drops in PageRank and in some cases, the drops are significant as reported on SearchEngineLand last week. Complaints about lower quality search results have sent Google back to the algorithm in a real battle with spam sites and others who would take over all the top search spots and lower PageRank for some is the result. The prime targets of Google’s efforts have been directories, blogs and other advertisers that are providing links for money.

Along with falling PageRank have come reports of significant drops in the rankings for some sites. Interestingly, there is not a clear one-to-one relationship between lower PageRank and falling search engine results rankings suggesting that Google is discounting the value of PageRank in their algorithm.

This comes as no surprise to some who claim that PageRank has actually been devalued for some time now in favor of Trust Rank — a method of evaluating links based less on quantity of links and more on quality of links. In particular, paid links from directories and blogs are expected to become less valuable to search rankings in the coming months.

So, why am I not worried? Because any good link strategy will cultivate inbound links with the idea of getting traffic – not just ranking – and because ultimately, content is still king. As search engine algorithms improve the quality of results, a well-designed site with good quality content will always rise to the top.