Google's PR Don't Mean Squat

[Steven Wagenheim]

Here's why.

I have a site that has been getting consistent traffic now for 3 years.
Nothing has changed. It's as popular now as it was then and making me
the same income every month like clockwork.

Yet, the PR has gone from 4 to 1.

If you guys are worried about your PR, it doesn't mean squat as far as your
bottom line unless you're trying to sell the site and your prospect is a PR
fanatic. Otherwise, it shouldn't affect your bottom line as long as you keep
driving traffic to the site.

If anybody has other experiences (sites that have dropped in PR and income
has also tailed off) please share them, but personally, I haven't seen a
bit of difference.

[Intrepreneur]

If you went from 4 to 1, in Google's eyes your site is becoming less popular i.e less people are linking to it.

All it takes is a bit of competition and your site is gone!

Mark

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Intrepreneur

If you went from 4 to 1, in Google's eyes your site is becoming less popular i.e less people are linking to it.

All it takes is a bit of competition and your site is gone!

Mark

Yeah, I know what it's supposed to mean but it hasn't affected my bottom
line from that site one bit...so again, IMO, it don't mean squat.

[ramkarthik]

It is nice to hear that. I had my blog's PR drop from 5 to 2 but I'm still getting good amount of traffic. But the question is, would it have been more if PR5 stayed?

And I also wonder why some people (including SEOs) advice others not to compete against a high PR site for a search term? They say it is better to go for a term which has less PR sites ranking in first page. If PR doesn't matter that much, why do they say so?

I believe there is still some value to PR but that is just my opinion.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

It is nice to hear that. I had my blog's PR drop from 5 to 2 but I'm still getting good amount of traffic. But the question is, would it have been more if PR5 stayed?

And I also wonder why some people (including SEOs) advice people not to compete against a high PR site for a search term? They say it is better to go for a term which has less PR sites ranking in first page. If PR doesn't matter that much, why do they say so?

I believe there is still some value to PR but that is just my opinion.

I'm a bottom line guy. If my PR drops and everything else stays the same,
then IMO, what's the point? It's like saying, "We don't like you as much
anymore...but we're still going to come to your site just as much and buy
just as much stuff."

It's like when somebody sticks their tongue out at me.

So what? As long as it doesn't affect my business, who cares?

Anyway, just my opinion on this PR thing.

[Francois du_Toit]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Otherwise, it shouldn't affect your bottom line as long as you keep driving traffic to the site.

What do you mean? How are you driving traffic to the site? Not sure I understand what the relevance is with PageRank...

[Lance K]

PR is a page thing, not a site thing.

Anyway, out of curiosity, have you been getting the same amount of traffic referred from Google since the PR drop?

I agree though, the bottom line rules.

[ramkarthik]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

I'm a bottom line guy. If my PR drops and everything else stays the same,
then IMO, what's the point? It's like saying, "We don't like you as much
anymore...but we're still going to come to your site just as much and buy
just as much stuff."

It's like when somebody sticks their tongue out at me.

So what? As long as it doesn't affect my business, who cares?

Anyway, just my opinion on this PR thing.

Yes I understand what you are saying.

Regarding the second question:

Normally article marketers don't go after search terms which have high PR sites ranking in the first page. Now if those sites had less PR, they would gone for it and made more money. So at that stage, it becomes 'your' business, right? That's the point I'm trying to say.

[kevinpotts]

PPC and lots of One Way Links.....links, links, links....the only thing that matters.

My friend Paul Lynch (a top SEO specialist with a company with 60 SEO staff and working for some of the biggest names in the industry) has recently been working on and perfecting a new PPC engine....with typical cost per acquisition of .20c. Now if that continues long term and he continues to drive down the price, PR certainly will become increasingly unimportant.

Kevin
Cambridge Business Academy

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Francois du_Toit

What do you mean? How are you driving traffic to the site? Not sure I understand what the relevance is with PageRank...

That's my point. Who cares what the PR is? If you just keep sending traffic
to the site, you'll continue to make sales and whether your PR is 5 or 7 or 0
it doesn't matter.

My point is, my site dropping from PR 4 to PR 1 has not affected my bottom
line ONE CENT. So why should I even care what my PR is?

[Lance K]

Originally Posted by Kingdom_Mines

when your site dissapears from google so will you sad but true.

Google must be your heroin.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

Yes I understand what you are saying.

Regarding the second question:

Normally article marketers don't go after search terms which have high PR sites ranking in the first page. Now if those sites had less PR, they would gone for it and made more money. So at that stage, it becomes 'your' business, right? That's the point I'm trying to say.

Actually, I write articles for keywords that have sites with very high PR
at the top of the SERPs. Doesn't bother me in the least. I still get more
than my share of traffic.

Just because you're not ranked number 1 at Google doesn't mean people
won't find you.

There ARE other ways...tons of them.

Google is not the be all and end all.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Lance K

PR is a page thing, not a site thing.

Anyway, out of curiosity, have you been getting the same amount of traffic referred from Google since the PR drop?

I agree though, the bottom line rules.

My traffic from Google has NEVER been great...EVER.

No different now than it was when I was PR 4. Because when I was PR 4
I was still NOWHERE near page one.

Hell, you couldn't have found my site with an LBT if you tried.

[utproducts]

Hi Steven,

Nice to see a high profile member such as your self spread the good word. You are correct, PR has nothing or little to do with how high you can rank in the SERPs. A big fat PR0 can rank #1 for very competitive terms. On the other hand, PR does matter for the sites linking to yours.

I'm with you on the bottom line part. Spending your time to do well in the SERPs is useless if you don't ever make any money. However, don't forget about those high ranking sites that can make you money indirectly.

Cheers

[Quentin]

I don't imagine any professional worth his salt would put to much creedence on just google. Marketing is an overall program and you should be getting traffic from many sources.

So many people have lost their income over the years through google changing the rules in Adwords, affiliate marketing and many more and then come in here whinning.

I am not saying you are doing this Steven as I know you are a professional marketer but I think too many people put to much emphasis on where they sit in Google.

It is a stastical fact that yahoo links and searchers are much more prone to buy and stay on a page for up to 200% longer that a Google searcher but no one in this forum talks about it much.

We have done our own test and find this to be true in many cases.

Not saying Google is not worth some effort but to many spend 80% of their time on Google for a 20% return.

Quentin

[Francois du_Toit]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

That's my point. Who cares what the PR is? If you just keep sending traffic
to the site, you'll continue to make sales and whether your PR is 5 or 7 or 0
it doesn't matter.

My point is, my site dropping from PR 4 to PR 1 has not affected my bottom
line ONE CENT. So why should I even care what my PR is?

Ok, I understand what you mean. However, what happens when you stop sending traffic to your site? Unless you rank well in Google for certain keywords your bottom line will suffer. This is where PageRank plays a role. It's certainly not the only factor but it plays a role.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Francois du_Toit

Ok, I understand what you mean. However, what happens when you stop sending traffic to your site? Unless you rank well in Google for certain keywords your bottom line will suffer. This is where PageRank plays a role. It's certainly not the only factor but it plays a role.

Hasn't for me. I got little traffic from Google when I was PR 4 and get about
the same traffic from it now that I am PR 1.

Bulk of my traffic has always come from other sources and the drop in PR
hasn't affected my Google traffic one little bit.

So again, who cares?

[Zeus66]

I've been privately smirking over the bruhaha over PR for years now. It's irrelevant to rankings. Anyone who has a page in the Top 10 at Google for a really competitive term will attest to that fact. I have a PR1 page in the Top 10 (has been for months) for an ultra-competitive term. It's about on-page and off-page SEO. PR is just window dressing.

John

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Kingdom_Mines

Then again if you didn't care you would not be ranting here, obviously you are not able to confirm its long term effects.

My 2 cents

Ricky

First of all, I'm not ranting. If you read my original post, I'm simply telling
people not to get all twisted up over PR.

Second of all, this hasn't been a recent change. My site dropped from PR 4
to PR 1 a while ago.

And, having just checked my AWStats from 2008 to 2009, my traffic has
actually increase by 1,000 uniques a month even though my links from
Google dropped by almost 50%.

Point is...Google does not rule the world like everybody thinks.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Zeus66

I've been privately smirking over the bruhaha over PR for years now. It's irrelevant to rankings. Anyone who has a page in the Top 10 at Google for a really competitive term will attest to that fact. I have a PR1 page in the Top 10 (has been for months) for an ultra-competitive term. It's about on-page and off-page SEO. PR is just window dressing.

John

John, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Maybe people will listen to you since you're not a grouchy old sour puss
like I am.

[ramkarthik]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

John, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Maybe people will listen to you since you're not a grouchy old sour puss
like I am.

LOL It's not like 'listening to one person and not to you'. It is more about getting your queries answered by top people in the forum. You know what you are doing. So the best way to learn things is by raising doubts on things you say. Isn't that fine?

[Francois du_Toit]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Hasn't for me. I got little traffic from Google when I was PR 4 and get about
the same traffic from it now that I am PR 1.

Bulk of my traffic has always come from other sources and the drop in PR
hasn't affected my Google traffic one little bit.

So again, who cares?

Fair enough. There are many factors that Google takes into consideration and PageRank is only one of them. However, to make a generalized comment such as "Google's PR Don't Mean Squat" is not helpful.

There can be many reasons why your site dropped in PR and why you are still getting the same amount of traffic from Google. Here is one possible reason... Google changed the way they calculate PR last year and it's possible that although your site had a drop in PR that your competitors had the same happen to them meaning the status quo didn't change.

Google is clear on the fact that PageRank plays a role in their algorithm. But, like I said, it's certainly not the only factor.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

LOL It's not like 'listening to one person and not to you'. It is more about getting your queries answered by top people in the forum. You know what you are doing. So the best way to learn things is by raising doubts on things you say. Isn't that fine?

If you read my original post, I invited people with a different experience to
share it.

So far, nobody has come here and said, "my site dropped from PR X to PR Y
and my traffic dried up."

And even if it did, there are sure to be other factors involved.

As I said, I have never relied on Google for my traffic. You couldn't find
my sites in the SERPs (using keyword lookup) if your life depended on it.

That was true when this one site was PR 4 and it's true now.

Maybe for people who live and die with Google it matters. I don't know.
I've never had a top ranked site there nor did I ever care if I did or not.

I came from the school of "drive traffic to your site" not wait until it comes
to you. So I can't relate to the mindset of people who bust their humps
trying to get a page 1 listing for keywords with 10 million competing sites.

I compete with those same sites without having to rely on a search
engine listing and get more than my share of traffic.

But like I said, if others have a different experience, I'm more than happy
to listen to it.

I'm simply sharing my own experience.

For me...Google PR don't mean squat.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Francois du_Toit

Fair enough. There are many factors that Google takes into consideration and PageRank is only one of them. However, to make a generalized comment such as "Google's PR Don't Mean Squat" is not helpful.

There can be many reasons why your site dropped in PR and why you are still getting the same amount of traffic from Google. Here is one possible reason... Google changed the way they calculate PR last year and it's possible that although your site had a drop in PR that your competitors had the same happen to them meaning the status quo didn't change.

Google is clear on the fact that PageRank plays a role in their algorithm. But, like I said, it's certainly not the only factor.

That's fair enough. Yes, it's possible that other sites I was competing
with also took a hit. Don't know. Don't care. All I care about is that even
with the hit, my traffic hasn't suffered. In fact, it's up 1,000 uniques per
month this year over last year.

I guess my point is this. So many people get so bent over PR when their
site goes down. I don't think it's all that big a deal and they should
concentrate more on other things that can get them just as much traffic,
if not more, to their site.

[utproducts]

Maybe for people who live and die with Google it matters. I don't know.
I've never had a top ranked site there nor did I ever care if I did or not.

I came from the school of "drive traffic to your site" not wait until it comes
to you. So I can't relate to the mindset of people who bust their humps
trying to get a page 1 listing for keywords with 10 million competing sites.

I compete with those same sites without having to rely on a search
engine listing and get more than my share of traffic.

Hi Steven,

Care to share what some of your most used traffic methods include?

[Francois du_Toit]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

I guess my point is this. So many people get so bent over PR when their site goes down. I don't think it's all that big a deal and they should concentrate more on other things that can get them just as much traffic, if not more, to their site.

Fully agree.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by qkz283

Hi Steven,

Care to share what some of your most used traffic methods include?

90% of my traffic comes from writing articles and submitting them to
article directories and other blogs as a guest author. Also from submitting
them to web 2.0 sites like Squidoo.

The other 10% comes from:

Forums
Safelists
FFA Sites
YouTube

That is essentially how I get my traffic.

Search Engines?

I can count my uniques from the SERPs on 20 hands.

If I relied on the SERPs, I'd be broke.

[Martin Luxton]

Steven, say it ain't so!

I was so proud two years ago when I got a brand new site to PR5 in less than a month.

Martin

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Martin Luxton

Steven, say it ain't so!

I was so proud two years ago when I got a brand new site to PR5 in less than a month.

Martin

Martin, question. Is the PR the same or higher or lower now and has your
traffic increased or decreased?

Just curious.

[Lance K]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Point is...Google does not rule the world like everybody thinks.

Well, not everybody.

[Frank Donovan]

Hi Steven

My experience is similar to yours and John's, in that any change in PR has had little or no effect on where my sites have ranked in the SERPS and thus the traffic has remained constant.

The only caveat I'd add is that I like to use a high PR site to link to a new site to help kickstart its ranking and I suspect a lower PR may affect that process.

But you're correct in that for any particular site it's the ranking that drives the traffic and if your SERPS is unaffected and your other traffic-generating methods are working, who cares about the PR?


Frank

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by Kingdom_Mines

Would your email not get pounded with spam??

Ricky

No, because I don't post...I host.

Big difference.

But that's a subject for another time.

[George Wright]

Francouis,

I really don't know if this is what you are doing, probably not but some people are mixing up PR (page rank the little green bar on top of the browser) With where you are on Google I.E. page one third from the top or page 32 top of the page for your key words.

I have a site PR 0 on top of google page one for my key words.

George Wright

Originally Posted by Francois du_Toit

Ok, I understand what you mean. However, what happens when you stop sending traffic to your site? Unless you rank well in Google for certain keywords your bottom line will suffer. This is where PageRank plays a role. It's certainly not the only factor but it plays a role.

[TristanPerry]

One of my old (large) sites went from 1 million page views per month to 2 million page views in around a year. Its homepage page rank went from PR 4 to PR 0. It still has PR 0 to this day, for some reason. But it's still more successful than before, keeps getting new backlinks, keeps getting unique content etc. Its also right at the top of Google (just below the very established authority sites) for its main, one-word keyword. So its PR has disappeared, but it's still as popular as ever and still very high in the SERPs. The PR change hasn't affected anything, nor has it corresponded to any change with the site. It just randomly lost the PR completely, yet the site is growing more and more popular. I no longer own this site (I created it and owned it for 7-8 years), but it's a good example (IMHO) at how PR can be a meaningless measure.

So yeah, it's just that PR is a bit weird, I try not to look at it too much. It can be a decent measure to look at, but anyone who looks at it waaay too much is on the wrong path.

[ramkarthik]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

If you read my original post, I invited people with a different experience to
share it.

So far, nobody has come here and said, "my site dropped from PR X to PR Y
and my traffic dried up."

And even if it did, there are sure to be other factors involved.

Maybe those types will come slowly. There are always people who see a drop in something (and the reason may not even be PR).

I came from the school of "drive traffic to your site" not wait until it comes
to you. So I can't relate to the mindset of people who bust their humps
trying to get a page 1 listing for keywords with 10 million competing sites.

I compete with those same sites without having to rely on a search
engine listing and get more than my share of traffic.

But isn't PR related more to Google and their search? There are many ways to get traffic. You can get tons of traffic from social media having PR 0. But when you talk about PR having no effect, you should be concentrating on what PR affects. It affects Google's search listings. I can list sites that rank for keywords they don't target just because they have high PR. One such blog is Problogger.Net (I'm an avid reader of this blog). You might be driving traffic but you are still missing that extra traffic you 'could' have got if you had high PR. Isn't that the same reason why people submit articles to high PR directories mostly?

But like I said, if others have a different experience, I'm more than happy
to listen to it.

I'm simply sharing my own experience.

For me...Google PR don't mean squat.

As I said in my first post, I get good traffic from Google search but I still doubt whether I could have got more if I had high PR. I don't have a clear conclusion about this PR thing. At times, I feel it matters and sometimes, I feel the opposite.

I'm waiting for someone to prove me wrong that PR doesn't REALLY matter.

Cheers,
Ramkarthik

[utproducts]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

90% of my traffic comes from writing articles and submitting them to
article directories and other blogs as a guest author. Also from submitting
them to web 2.0 sites like Squidoo.

The other 10% comes from:

Forums
Safelists
FFA Sites
YouTube

That is essentially how I get my traffic.

Search Engines?

I can count my uniques from the SERPs on 20 hands.

If I relied on the SERPs, I'd be broke.

Interesting. Thank you. I do have one question, though.

How much TOTAL traffic do you see from the search engines. As in, how many of your Squidoo visitors, article readers, etc. come from the search engines?

I understand that directly you may not get much to your sites, but what do you think about the overall percentage?

I'm guessing your traffic mostly comes from the search engines.

Not saying that your writing isn't quality, but you are a QUANTITY type of person. As in, put out a lot of articles quickly, instead of optimize the ones you already have.

With the amount of content that you have, you are probably all over the search engines.

Your method of article marketing is not bad and I known you've seen success, but you will probably agree with me that it is A LOT of hard work.

Thoughts?

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

You might be driving traffic but you are still missing that extra traffic you 'could' have got if you had high PR.

Ramkarthik

If that were the case, then I should have gotten more traffic from Google
when I was PR 4 than when I dropped to PR 1. I didn't. The traffic is
literally the same.

So personally, I am not seeing the effects.

I can't speak for everybody else, which is why, again, I am more than
happy to listen to other experiences.

[Dan C. Rinnert]

Google can take its PR and stuff itself.

I have a site that's PR0 and it makes more money for me than another one of my sites that is a PR3.

And, I had a site that was PR3 or PR4 and now it's down to PR0, even though traffic continues to grow. But, maybe that'll mean income will increase on it.

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by qkz283

Your method of article marketing is not bad and I known you've seen success, but you will probably agree with me that it is A LOT of hard work.

Thoughts?

Hell yeah. It took me 3 years to get to the point where I can pretty much
stop writing and still get enough traffic to my sites from what I have out
there.

I never said MY way was easy.

The only purpose of this thread was to show that PR isn't the be all and
end all like so many people think.

Heck, if my PR dropped to 0 I wouldn't care.

That SHOULD tell you something.

[ramkarthik]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

If that were the case, then I should have gotten more traffic from Google
when I was PR 4 than when I dropped to PR 1. I didn't. The traffic is
literally the same.

So personally, I am not seeing the effects.

I can't speak for everybody else, which is why, again, I am more than
happy to listen to other experiences.

Okay I have a question?

Say I have two blogs in same niche. One blog is PR4 and other is PR1.

I target a keyword and write an article for each of the blog for that keyword (with almost same quality, keyword density etc). Which one has the better chance of ranking in Google?

(I'm concentrating on ranking in Google because we are talking about Google PR)

[Francois du_Toit]

Originally Posted by George Wright

I really don't know if this is what you are doing, probably not but some people are mixing up PR (page rank the little green bar on top of the browser) With where you are on Google I.E. page one third from the top or page 32 top of the page for your key words.

I have a site PR 0 on top of google page one for my key words.

George Wright

Hi George,

Good point, but to answer your question... No, I am not referring to the PR toolbar. You're right that many people think the little green bar is an accurate reflection of PR while this is not the case.

All the best,

Francois

[Martin Luxton]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Martin, question. Is the PR the same or higher or lower now and has your
traffic increased or decreased?

Just curious.

Steven,

It's PR3 now and the traffic is way lower.

Actually, it was a spoof April Fool's site and it got massive traffic in the first week. I haven't done anything with it for 18 months but probably the reason it's still a PR3 is because of the great backlinks it got from authority sites in the first week (e.g. three PR7 news sites in different countries).

Martin

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

Okay I have a question?

Say I have two blogs in same niche. One blog is PR4 and other is PR1.

I target a keyword and write an article for each of the blog for that keyword (with almost same quality, keyword density etc). Which one has the better chance of ranking in Google?

(I'm concentrating on ranking in Google because we are talking about Google PR)

I honestly can't answer that question because from what I have seen at
Google (some of it blows my mind) I honestly have NO clue why some sites
rank so high.

I could give you examples here for some niches where the top ranked site
is a page of crap, PR of 0 and a site on page 2 of Google is an authority
site with excellent content and a PR of 3 or 4.

It makes no sense whatsoever.

But THAT is the reality.

So the answer to your question is...no clue...not anymore.

[utproducts]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

Hell yeah. It took me 3 years to get to the point where I can pretty much
stop writing and still get enough traffic to my sites from what I have out
there.

I never said MY way was easy.

The only purpose of this thread was to show that PR isn't the be all and
end all like so many people think.

Heck, if my PR dropped to 0 I wouldn't care.

That SHOULD tell you something.

What do you think about what I said about how much total traffic you get from the search engines?

I do agree with you (and John) regarding PR. And, the first post I made in this thread is not opinion or speculation. It's true. A VERY VERY competitive niche is dominated by a PR0 site.

I'm not saying the technical details I claim are FACT or that they will never change. NO ONE knows for sure.

[ramkarthik]

Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim

I honestly can't answer that question because from what I have seen at
Google (some of it blows my mind) I honestly have NO clue why some sites
rank so high.

I could give you examples here for some niches where the top ranked site
is a page of crap, PR of 0 and a site on page 2 of Google is an authority
site with excellent content and a PR of 3 or 4.

It makes no sense whatsoever.

But THAT is the reality.

So the answer to your question is...no clue...not anymore.

So that means we can't write off PR, right?

I never understood their algorithm and guess, I never will. And I'm on the same boat as you. I said in my previous post:

I don't have a clear conclusion about this PR thing. At times, I feel it matters and sometimes, I feel the opposite.

I can only hope for Google to come out and clear things up about PR (which will obviously never happen)

Cheers,
Ramkarthik

[Francois du_Toit]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

So that means we can't write off PR, right?

I never understood their algorithm and guess, I never will. And I'm on the same boat as you. I said in my previous post:



I can only hope for Google to come out and clear things up about PR (which will obviously never happen)

Cheers,
Ramkarthik

Lol, hold your horses...

Google is pretty clear on the role PageRank plays. It plays a role in Google's algorithm and may not be as important as some people think it is but it is a factor Google takes into consideration. I have posted a post on one of my blogs recently that you may find interesting...

PageRank Demystified

All the best,

Francois

[Istvan Horvath]

After reading this thread I went to an old blog of mine (it is online for almost 5 years but quite neglected lately...). Its PR used to be between 4-6. Now, to my great surprise, it has PR 0. Zero.

Next I went to G. Analytics and compared the traffic from last summer and this summer. It is almost the same: visits down by 1.74%, however absolute unique is up by 2.12%; new visits are also up by 3.10%.

It is true, there was a change in the percentage of traffic sent by search engines (-10%) but got way more visits from referring sites - not articles, just people linking to it.

The reason they are linking to it: the blog has quite a number of WordPress related tutorials. And even with the PR 0 if you perform a search for many of those WP related tutorials, my posts come up on the first page in results, as they did when the site had PR 5.

I cannot speak much of the "bottom line" because that blog has never been properly monetized (it was more of a hobby) but its position in SERP and the general traffic numbers didn't really change because of the drastic drop in PR.

So, I would say Steven is right in his OP

[Steven Wagenheim]

Originally Posted by ramkarthik

I never understood their algorithm and guess, I never will. And I'm on the same boat as you. I said in my previous post:



I can only hope for Google to come out and clear things up about PR (which will obviously never happen)

Cheers,
Ramkarthik

Which is why I don't worry about it.

Bottom line for my site:

PR 4 to PR 1

Traffic - No Change.

No, correction...Traffic increased by 1,000 uniques per month.

What else matters?

I mean really, if somebody can tell me what else matters besides how
much traffic you get to your site and how much money you make, I'd
love to hear it.

[cashcow]

I can count my uniques from the SERPs on 20 hands.

AHA! Now we know how you can produce so many articles so quickly - you have 20 hands!!!!

I've also noticed no difference in traffic when PR has dropped (or even gone up) for sites. I guess it could be a delayed effect but I really think the PR that google shows you has little relation to what google itself thinks your PR is. I think they might be just playing around with us on that front.

Honestly, I stopped looking at PR a long time ago. I only care about it if I am fixing to sell a site and that's only because other people seem to think it is important.

Lee

[TristanPerry]

It seems thus far that the verdict in this thread is thus:

A change in PR doesn't appear to change SERPs, traffic, or revenue.

What's important?

Traffic and revenue.

Hence to me it's safe to assume that a change in PR isn't the end of the World