The Google PageRank Mythos
The top position in Google’s PageRank is considered by many as the holy grail of optimization work. Considering that Google is the leading search engine used by many people (hence the term googling), this is no overstatement. In fact, SEO’s put in much work in order to get to the top of the ranks, not to mention staying there for a long time.
Interestingly, because of this “reverence” to PageRank, a wide variety of myths surrounding it has appeared among SEOs. Some of these are nothing more than amusing stories that some SEO’s invented in their spare times. But there are those that need to looked closer since these are the ones that can affect optimization work.
Probably the most persistent of these myths are the ones pertaining to how PageRank statistics are actually calculated. These came about as Google was initially quite secretive (they still are, though not that much) about how rankings were being determined. Some SEOs offered seemingly plausible explanation which many actually took to heart.
One of the most common of these says that Google calculates your PageRank on the scale of 1 to 19. These stems out mostly from those people who have used the Google Toolbar. The thing is, the figure on the toolbar is just a rounded of value of your actual rank. This is to provide you with a quick reference rather than showing your actual rank. Thus, don’t be surprised if you find a site that has the same toolbar rank as yours but still place much higher than you in actual rankings.
Another common misconception is that PageRank is determined solely by the number backlinks a site has. This one is quite notorious for making SEO’s and site administrators too obsessed with getting many backlinks at all cost, some even going as far as to purchase links. While incoming links do play a big role in the ranking process, there are still many other factors that you need to consider. Actual traffic, for one, is also a big consideration. You might have more backlinks than the competitor, but if no one is actually using them to go to your site, then you can expect your site will be lower in value.
This one extends to notions about your position on the search results. Many often believe that the higher your PageRank is, the higher you also register on the search page. This is not entirely false, however, PageRank is only a small part of the whole equation. You will expectantly not get to the top of the search page for cats if you don’t have any content about them, even if you use the word “cat” plenty of times. Here, the idea of relevance becomes a much bigger factor.
Some SEOs also insist that using meta tags will help you increase PageRank. Here’s the sad truth, while some other search engines use them, Google doesn’t. Rather, it uses meta tags to keep track of your pages. This means there’s no use in stuffing your meta tags with so much keywords.
There are other PageRank myths that you need to get used to. It is important that you be familiar with them before doing any optimization work so that you won’t easily fall for any mistakes that these might cause.