{"id":27917,"date":"2016-06-03T10:00:42","date_gmt":"2016-06-03T17:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bruceclay.com\/blog\/?p=27917"},"modified":"2019-07-03T12:08:55","modified_gmt":"2019-07-03T19:08:55","slug":"what-is-pagerank","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bruceclay.com\/blog\/what-is-pagerank\/","title":{"rendered":"What Is Google PageRank, How Is It Earned, & Does It Still Matter?"},"content":{"rendered":"

When a user enters\u00a0a search query, the search engine\u2019s number one goal is to return results that are high-quality, relevant, and able to best give them what they want. One of the 200+ SEO<\/a> factors Google takes into consideration to determine which webpages best fit the bill is PageRank.<\/p>\n

What Is PageRank?<\/h2>\n

PageRank (PR) is a\u00a0calculation, famously invented by Google founders\u00a0Larry Page and Sergey Brin, which evaluates\u00a0the quality and quantity of links to a webpage to determine a relative score of that page’s importance and authority on a 0 to 10 scale.<\/p>\n

\"how<\/a>The handful of PageRank 10 domains, including USA.gov, Twitter.com and Adobe Reader Download, have the highest volume of inbound links of any sites on the web.<\/p>\n

The top sites set the bar, so to speak, and the 10-point scale plummets exponentially down from there.<\/p>\n

PageRank 5 websites have a good number of inbound links, PR 3 and PR 4 sites have a fair amount, and brand new websites without any inbound links pointing to them start at PageRank 0.<\/p>\n

NOTE: You may be curious what your site\u2019s or your competitor\u2019s PR score is. But Google no longer reveals the PageRank score for websites. It used to display at the top of web browsers right in the Google Toolbar, but no more. And PR data is no longer available to developers through APIs, either. Even though it\u2019s now hidden from public view, however, PageRank remains an important ingredient in Google\u2019s secret ranking algorithms<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

Since Google wants to return page one results that are high quality, relevant, and trustworthy, it may return webpages with better PageRank scores higher up in the SERPs, although PageRank is only one of many ranking factors taken into consideration.<\/p>\n

Since PageRank is only one factor in the Google ranking algorithm, it’s important to remember that a high PageRank does not guarantee high rankings — but it can significantly help.<\/p>\n

NOTE: <\/strong> With the growth of mobile internet use, it is especially important to also consider how Google’s Mobilegeddon Update<\/a> will affect search rankings.<\/em><\/p>\n

What Is \u201cLink Juice\u201d and What Are PageRank \u201cPoints\u201d?<\/h2>\n

When Site A links to your web page, Google sees this as Site A endorsing, or casting a vote for, your page. Google takes into consideration all of these link votes (i.e., the website\u2019s link profile) to draw conclusions about the relevance and significance of individual webpages and your website as a whole. This is the basic concept behind PageRank.<\/p>\n

When a website links to your site, or when you link internally from one of your pages to another, the link passes PageRank points. This passing of PageRank points is also commonly called \u201clink juice<\/strong>\u201d or \u201clink equity\u201d\u00a0transfer.<\/p>\n

The amount of link juice passed depends on two things: the number of PageRank points<\/strong> of the webpage housing the link, and the total number of links on the webpage that are passing PageRank. It’s worth noting here that\u00a0while Google will give every website a public-facing PageRank score that is between 1 and 10, the\u00a0\u201cpoints\u201d each page accumulates from the link juice passed by high-value inbound links can — and do — significantly surpass ten. For instance, webpages on the most powerful and significant websites can pass link juice points in the hundreds or thousands. To keep the rating system concise, Google uses a lot of math to correlate very large (and very small) PageRank values with a neat and clean 0 to 10 rating scale.<\/p>\n

How Link Juice Is Passed<\/h2>\n

Think of it this way: Every webpage has a limited amount of link juice it can pass, and the top of that limit is the total PageRank points that page has accrued. So, a webpage with 20 accrued PageRank points cannot pass more than 20 points of link juice per page.<\/p>\n

If a page with 20 PageRank points links to one other page, that one link will transfer the full amount of link juice to that one other webpage. But if a page with 20 PageRank points links to five webpages (internal or external), each link will transfer only one-fifth of the link juice.<\/p>\n

Google applies a decay value to every pass, so the actual numbers will be a little less than our diagram shows below. But to explain the PageRank concept simply, the formula is PR points divided by number of on-page links, or in this case, 20 divided by 5:<\/p>\n

\"PageRank_flow\"<\/a>
Visualize it: This diagram shows what it looks like when a webpage with 20 PageRank points links out to five other webpages that, accordingly, each receive approximately four PageRank points.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What if you want to link to several resources to aid user experience, but you have a strategic reason to withhold passing\u00a0PageRank to those pages?<\/p>\n

You can tell Google not to pass PageRank by amending some links with a rel=”nofollow” attribute.\u00a0A nofollowed link is not crawled by the search engines, and no PageRank or anchor text signals are transferred.<\/p>\n

However, Google still sees nofollowed links as part of the total number of links on the page. The PageRank value available to pass through the remaining, followed links is thus reduced.<\/p>\n

So for example, if you have a web page with 100 PR points that has four links on it, and three of those links have rel=”nofollow” tags, the one link that doesn\u2019t<\/em> have rel=”nofollow” will probably still pass only one-fourth, or 25 points, of link juice. (Find out when\u00a0nofollow is essential below.)<\/p>\n

Transferring PageRank\/Link Juice with Internal Linking<\/h2>\n

You can help Google see pages of your website as subject matter authorities by linking to your own important pages from related articles.<\/p>\n

For instance, if you have an article called \u201cHow To Do Keyword Research,\u201d you can help reinforce to Google the relevance of this page for the subject\/phrase \u201ckeyword research\u201d by linking from an article reviewing a keyword research tool to your How To Do Keyword Research article. This linking strategy is part of effective\u00a0siloing<\/a>,\u00a0which helps clarify your main website themes.<\/p>\n

When Nofollow Is Essential<\/strong><\/h3>\n

Adding rel=”nofollow” to a link may not conserve PageRank in the way SEOs once used it \u2014 to sculpt the flow of PR value through a site (aka \u201clink sculpting<\/a>\u201d). Still, nofollow is essential for certain types of links:<\/p>\n