Does PR matter?

[outwest]

Kind of a bit of a back and forth on the analyzing top 10 competition thread then we get into a big argument about PR, and does it matter in rankings. I have heard many times it makes zero difference which I tend to agree with more than disagree with,

Here is my problem with PR though

An Adsense course I just bought from guys who have been around way longer than newbies, on their section (100 page tutorial) on top 10 competition, they basically look for this

1. Sites with PR4 or lower on position 5 of the top 10
2. sites with lowest BLP (backlinks to the actual page) as possible

Theorizing as the reason for this, their justification is that sites with PR 5, 6,7 etc especially those with strong backlinks (assumedly this means a high number of high PR backlinks) will be way more difficult to outrank than sites with lower PR, (PR4 Or less)

Assumedly they base this on past experience, but the question is,
Is this a valid theory

If PR doesnt matter, then why worry about outranking pages that are PR5 or higher?

It should not make a difference they should all be just as easy to outrank (theoretically) at least if the theory that PR makes no difference in the SERPs , holds true


Ok if this IS TRUE (PR does not matter)
why do people worry about it? Why do people go to so much trouble then to pay 100s of dollars per month for high PR backlink networks. ?

Apparently the PR of your backlinks (higher the better ) certainly DOES matter as far as google giving weight to your site, and since the strength of your backlinks makes a huge difference in your rankings.....................and since the PR of those backlinks makes a huge difference in their strength and the authority google gives your site.....................based on that analysis, Then PR definitely DOES MATTER, .........A LOT
So I guess when people talk about PR, the statement should be

The PR of your Backlinks matters and it matters a lot

But when these guys go for such high PR backlink networks , to me the ultimate result will be that their own site's PR rises dramatically

Look at that lose weight fast site that went to number one. Do you think its a coincidence he has so many high PR backlinks and he also 301 redirected a 10 yr old PR6 site to his site?


Why did he do that if PR makes no difference?

btw his site is now a PR6

this is where the confusion lies

[outwest]

I realize that onpage SEO is perhaps WAY more important than PR perhaps PR is just a side benefit of good backlinks and rankings,

the whole thing is difficult to figure out the strategy to which kws to target though

I think with new sites, site age works against you and the site does not yet have trust by google until perhaps 6 months

[outwest]

Confidence builds with success
at this point I have not ranked many sites, then again I am just starting back into making sites

I ranked my familys resort number 2 in about 3 months but
that was a very non competitive kw

I do not have experience with success ranking competitive kws but I am sure that will come with time and experience

My question about PR is this
Why do you think the Adsense 100k tutorial those guys will steer clear of targeting kws where all the competition on the top 10 is PR5 or higher

if PR does not matter
do you think they are just unaware of this?
These guys did not just fall off the turnip truck yesterday they have been ranking sites for about 10 yrs

[GracefulSwan]

Pr is useless, don't ever focus on it.

[GracefulSwan]

Well considering it is just a number and anybody can achieve PR5 in a matter of days it is worthless. Why worry about a number that means nothing? PR has been dead for years but silly "SEO Experts" think otherwise, focus on quality content and stop wasting time on PR.

[yukon]

Originally Posted by outwest

I realize that onpage SEO is perhaps WAY more important than PR perhaps PR is just a side benefit of good backlinks and rankings,

the whole thing is difficult to figure out the strategy to which kws to target though

I think with new sites, site age works against you and the site does not yet have trust by google until perhaps 6 months

I know you don't want to hear me say this again.

Forget PR in the SERPs.

The only thing you need to look at PR for is backlinks, & that's not always 100%. The reason is PR is Googles way of saying I trust this page based on the incoming links that are associated with this page. The exception would be If wikipedia created a new page today PR0 (after Indexed) & then pointed 100 PR5 links from older internal pages that already have higher PRs, Google will still pass authority to that new wiki page. Even before showing the PR update on any PR tools. It's still an authority page.

Again, the only thing PR is good for is backlinks, it has no effect on the SERPs just because the page has a high PR, If that page isn't targeting the exact keyword (backlink anchor-text + on-page seo).

Now If you had a PR5 page with 100 PR6 backlinks with anchor-text on the backlinks, chances are you'll be #1 in the SERPs for an average competition keyword. Still it's not a gurantee, your competition might say screw this guy, I'm getting ready to have 500, PR7 backlinks with the exact same keyword anchor-text. One week later the new guy with a boat load of high PR backlinks will own that keyword in the SERPs.

[outwest]

Originally Posted by yukon

I know you don't want to hear me say this again.

Forget PR in the SERPs.

The only thing you need to look at PR for is backlinks, & that's not always 100%. The reason is PR is Googles way of saying I trust this page based on the incoming links that are associated with this page. The exception would be If wikipedia created a new page today PR0 (after Indexed) & then pointed 100 PR5 links from older internal pages that already have higher PRs, Google will still pass authority to that new wiki page. Even before showing the PR update on any PR tools. It's still an authority page.

Again, the only thing PR is good for is backlinks, it has no effect on the SERPs just because the page has a high PR, If that page isn't targeting the exact keyword (backlink anchor-text + on-page seo).

Now If you had a PR5 page with 100 PR6 backlinks with anchor-text on the backlinks, chances are you'll be #1 in the SERPs for an average competition keyword. Still it's not a gurantee, your competition might say screw this guy, I'm getting ready to have 500, PR7 backlinks with the exact same keyword anchor-text. One week later the new guy with a boat load of high PR backlinks will own that keyword in the SERPs.

So when analyzing top 10 competition

#1,2 and 3 on the top ten are just root domains, no subpage
they all have thousands of backlinks
and they are all high PR, 6 or above

but
their onpage SEO is N N N N, (not targeting the kw in header, title, url, or description)

so you would go for that kw? knowing the top 3 sites have that high of PR that many backlinks? or would you look for another kw?

thing is, if you do decide to target a kw, (this applies to all of us) we have to make SEO optimized pages for the kws, then spend all the time backlinking the hell out of that page

so deciding yes or no to target it or not, to me is a hugely important decision, who wants to waste all that time targeting a kw they will not be able to outrank the competition? not me

I have no problem finding low traffic kws that have positions 1,2 and 3 on Google top 10 have totally lame competition with almost no backlinks

find kws with good traffic though, that I think I can outrank is not easy at all, it sometimes takes days

so thats why I spend so much time finding out high PR and high backlinks is truly a deal breaker, there seems to be a lot of disagreement on this issue. Seems to be a bit of a complicated dance to find out what is truly important.

this PR thing though, seems to be a very contentious issue

[roger h]

how exactly can PR5 be achieved in a matter of days...? i'd love to know the process involved..

[yukon]

Originally Posted by outwest

So when analyzing top 10 competition

#1,2 and 3 on the top ten are just root domains, no subpage
they all have thousands of backlinks
and they are all high PR, 6 or above

but
their onpage SEO is N N N N, (not targeting the kw in header, title, url, or description)

so you would go for that kw? knowing the top 3 sites have that high of PR that many backlinks? or would you look for another kw?

Heck yes I'll go after it!

Before I decide I'll target that keyword, the first thing I'm going to do is open SeoSpyglass & look at their keyword anchor-text on the backlinks.

If that #1 guy in the SERPs is ranking for the keyword car insurance, & all his backlink anchor text is focused on just insurance, I will create all my anchor-text as car insurance (for the page I'm going to rank), & hammer out some backlinks that are high PR on the exact same page as my backlink.

You have to make your own decisions, is the keyword payout worth my time to rank this page in the SERPs. It doesn't matter If your trying to rank for car insurance or the keyword phrase golf balls from outer space, you still have to be able to make the call, is it worth the effort needed to rank this page.

If the keyword car insurance gets 5,000 search per day, & the affliate offer your running pays $10 per lead, assume you'll get 30-40% of that traffic, maybe a 10% conversion rate, is it worth your time to target that keyword & own that keyword in the SERPs?

Do the math...

I get $1500 per day, on the low side (30%) of the traffic for #1 position.

Keep in mind the above keyword/traffic is an example, I didn't check the actual traffic, still I'm sure that keyword is high traffic. I know affliate offers exist for that keyword that pay $8-10+ per lead.

[outwest]

Originally Posted by yukon

Heck yes I'll go after it!

Before I decide I'll target that keyword, the first thing I'm going to do is open SeoSpyglass & look at their keyword anchor-text on the backlinks.

If that #1 guy in the SERPs is ranking for the keyword car insurance, & all his backlink anchor text is focused on just insurance, I will create all my anchor-text as car insurance (for the page I'm going to rank), & hammer out some backlinks that are high PR on the exact same page as my backlink.

You have to make your own decisions, is the keyword payout worth my time to rank this page in the SERPs. It doesn't matter If your trying to rank for car insurance or the keyword phrase golf balls from outer space, you still have to be able to make the call, is it worth the effort needed to rank this page.

If the keyword car insurance gets 5,000 search per day, & the affliate offer your running pays $10 per lead, assume you'll get 30-40% of that traffic, maybe a 10% conversion rate, is it worth your time to target that keyword & own that keyword in the SERPs?

Do the math...

I get $1500 per day, on the low side (30%) of the traffic for #1 position.

Keep in mind the above keyword/traffic is an example, I didn't check the actual traffic, still I'm sure that keyword is high traffic. I know affliate offers exist for that keyword that pay $8-10+ per lead.

Thanks yeah I appreciate the technical aspect of this analysis
I enjoy the hunt myself, and I am just learning how to make the decision of whether to go for a kw or not, I do also appreciate your input

how do insurance companies pay per lead? I guess its just a referral type deal?

[mrjonman]

Originally Posted by laptopwarmonmylap

Quality content, you say? As if that is not a given from the word go for anyone launching a site who has the slightest bit of sense.

Hey LapTop I must disagree. There were TONS of spammy AdSense sites out there that had very little content but making money. I would say that, since it worked, the owners had quite a bit of sense.

However, you will be happy to know that Google agrees with you. Most of these sites got slapped silly by Panda.

AFA PageRank, I tend to agree that it only helps with strengthening backlinks.

And OnPage SEO really is making a comeback. 10-15 years ago it was important and paid attention to. Then it kind of drifted out of favor for some reason but it is making a strong come back these days.

OnPage SEO that is done correctly and completely will do wonders in ranking your website. I've seen client's websites ranking as high as #3 in a tough looking market that had thousands of backlinks but very poor OnPage SEO.

My client was on page two. He found he was not optimized completely (5 out of 10 showed red in my software in under 10 seconds) and after correcting all of these (verified quickly by getting all green marks in my software) he's at #3 the very next day.

That's my $0.025 anyhow,

John Mann

[commoditytrainer]

Originally Posted by outwest

Kind of a bit of a back and forth on the analyzing top 10 competition thread then we get into a big argument about PR, and does it matter in rankings. I have heard many times it makes zero difference which I tend to agree with more than disagree with,

Here is my problem with PR though

An Adsense course I just bought from guys who have been around way longer than newbies, on their section (100 page tutorial) on top 10 competition, they basically look for this

1. Sites with PR4 or lower on position 5 of the top 10
2. sites with lowest BLP (backlinks to the actual page) as possible

Theorizing as the reason for this, their justification is that sites with PR 5, 6,7 etc especially those with strong backlinks (assumedly this means a high number of high PR backlinks) will be way more difficult to outrank than sites with lower PR, (PR4 Or less)

Assumedly they base this on past experience, but the question is,
Is this a valid theory

If PR doesnt matter, then why worry about outranking pages that are PR5 or higher?

It should not make a difference they should all be just as easy to outrank (theoretically) at least if the theory that PR makes no difference in the SERPs , holds true


Ok if this IS TRUE (PR does not matter)
why do people worry about it? Why do people go to so much trouble then to pay 100s of dollars per month for high PR backlink networks. ?

Apparently the PR of your backlinks (higher the better ) certainly DOES matter as far as google giving weight to your site, and since the strength of your backlinks makes a huge difference in your rankings.....................and since the PR of those backlinks makes a huge difference in their strength and the authority google gives your site.....................based on that analysis, Then PR definitely DOES MATTER, .........A LOT
So I guess when people talk about PR, the statement should be

The PR of your Backlinks matters and it matters a lot

But when these guys go for such high PR backlink networks , to me the ultimate result will be that their own site's PR rises dramatically

Look at that lose weight fast site that went to number one. Do you think its a coincidence he has so many high PR backlinks and he also 301 redirected a 10 yr old PR6 site to his site?


Why did he do that if PR makes no difference?

btw his site is now a PR6

this is where the confusion lies

PR does matter, but not to be completely focused on. You are correct to surmise that PR from other pages will flow to your site, but taking that into consideration the PR of this thread is 0 will the main page is 5 therefore the flow through to your site would be from a PR 0 site, in theory, but Google doesn't look at it that way, as far as I know. There are so many variables to consider, but what you want to consider is the flow through of dofollow links from Higher PR to lift your PR with careful consideration of each page where are links are posted. i.e. what is the PR of the page and not the main home page of the site.

[yukon]

Originally Posted by outwest

Thanks yeah I appreciate the technical aspect of this analysis
I enjoy the hunt myself, and I am just learning how to make the decision of whether to go for a kw or not, I do also appreciate your input

how do insurance companies pay per lead? I guess its just a referral type deal?

Yes, most pay by referral/lead, each is different but most want some personal contact info from the traffic source.

You could also pretty much create your own referral system on a local scale with local insurance/real-estate agents that don't know squat about the internet (let alone seo). Tell them you'll bring them traffic, in exchange for 50% of the commission they get, If they say no, tell them you'll stick with their direct competition then, thanks for their time.

If they take the bait, send them 2-3 referrals as a test, get paid & all is good, keep sending them referrals. Don't send to much traffic at once. Keep in mind I believe that most states allow any licensed real-estate agent to show a house, even If there not the real-estate business that listed the house. That means a lead/referral for any local real-estate is fair game If you can connect a buyer to the real-estate agent. The lady that sold my house to me was not the person listing the house for sale. Insurance is a lot more niche (life, health, auto, etc...).

Might even be worth while to target everyone that is local & licensed to sell insurance/real-estate in the local area.

They would have to be crazy to turn down 50% commission on a referral/lead that they would have never had without your help.

When I bought my house I did 100% of the house hunting online, I'm sure most people do the same. Still you have a lot of folks selling offline that don't understand the internet, that's your selling point (middle man).

[UMS]

Originally Posted by GracefulSwan

Pr is useless, don't ever focus on it.

That's an extremely sweeping statement.

Are you saying that if you were offered a contextual backlink of a permanent valid PR7 or PR0 page, you wouldn't care less?

I know which one I'd take and I've seen the results of having just a single backlink off a high PR page.

[yukon]

Originally Posted by UMS

That's an extremely sweeping statement.

Are you saying that if you were offered a contextual backlink of a permanent valid PR7 or PR0 page, you wouldn't care less?

I know which one I'd take and I've seen the results of having just a single backlink off a high PR page.

Lol, always a none believer in the bunch.

[Mike Anthony]

Originally Posted by yukon

Lol, always a none believer in the bunch.

I THINK if you read what he wrote you might agree with him. Its basically what you implied earlier which was correct PR DOES matter with incoming links. Thats what confuses people when we have threads and posts implying PR does not matter. It most certainly does matter with links.

[paulgl]

Originally Posted by mrjonman

However, you will be happy to know that Google agrees with you. Most of these sites got slapped silly by Panda.
John Mann

That's a sweeping statement. What is most? 51%? And how did you
measure this? You found all small sites, totaled them, and came up with
"most"? I have no idea why myths still abound with panda.

Originally Posted by 2423898

I don't think it does. It depends more on how long you've had your site, how many articles you've written and how much you promote your blog.

So....you have to have a blog? Nothing of what you say really matters. If it did,
then anyone who trumps in every category wins. But they don't. So it
does not matter how long you have had your site, or how many articles you have
written, and if you just promote a blog, well, you have to translate that to SERPS,
of which website promotion in and of itself does nothing. That's why people
use adwords. Tons of promotion....does it affect SERPS?

PR does matter. In many aspects. From first look, to perceived authority.

If wikipedia.org, for example, was PR1, would that have an effect on search
results? You betcha.

Paul

[Dentist]

From my experience PR matters and matters a lot if you understand it correctly. PR represents the collective importance of all your past efforts. If you have a high PR website and leave it without new content and backlink then a lower PR website that continually updates and provides new content and backlink can beat you. But if the higher PR website generated content and backlink with the same speed then the lower PR website doesn't stand a chance. So here is the simple form: If you have competitors that have high PR meaning their collective effort in the past X years has been a great amount, to beat them you need to be a lot faster generating new contents and new backlinks. (Obviously the quality of content and quality of backlinks (PR, relevancy, anchor text, etc) matter as well.

[info4bd]

Thanks for the info
i am on the path

[easyrider7]

If you want to see the relative importance of PR for the keyword you are targeting then calculate the PR of the top 30 results in Google of that keyword. Anyone who has done this will know that it is never the case that they are ordered from highest to lowest in PR. In many cases that I have seen, there is only a very weak relationship between PR and Google search engine rankings. Of course though, if the sites in the top spots have PR3 and you have PR7, then you have a very good chance of beating them. But just reaching PR4 is probably not going to be enough on its own to beat them.

[Billing System]

yes, PR is important because Search engine Gives more priority to those websites which websites contains high page rank

[mosthost]

PageRank is still extremely important. In fact, it's still at the heart of the Google ranking system. Named after CEO Larry Page, PageRank is not going anywhere.

That said, VISIBLE PR on the toolbar is not always accurate. Plus, for specific search terms it might not matter as much as other factors. That said, I can see why people looking for easy niche rankings would ignore a PR5 or PR6 challenger. That page already has a lot of backlinks.

Also, PR is for PAGES not sites as so many people seem to think.

[DudeAndy]

Originally Posted by GracefulSwan

Pr is useless, don't ever focus on it.

Well, its not useless if you are planning to sell the website or sell sidewide links. People always ask for PR in this cases.

[willium4]

PR doesn't matter for high ranking. If you search with anything and look at some sites, then you knows that some sites having low PR is also ranked on top position than high pr sites.

[eviezamora]

A low PR won't stop you from ranking well in the search engines but I would rather build backlinks to PR 4-6 blogs and forums rather than PR 0-2 because these websites don't have as high a level of trust in Google's eyes.

[NEseO]

I agree with Yukon on this one.

PR as a general does not matter in the slightest, it is all about their keyword targeting. As Yukon said if they are targeting a related keyword with their anchor text and they are ranking for a similar one, but not exact, then yes you should go for it and target the specific anchor text you want to target.

Although this being said, you are right that the PR of your backlinks has a big impact (yes I am one of those network owners ) and if targeted right then you should be able to rank for tougher keywords. Once you have these high PR backlinks to your site then no doubt your PR will go up so it does have an impact although not always completely relative to SERPS.

[John Moore]

Yes, it definitely counts, others will say it doesn't matter, however I think having pagerank is better than not having PR, in my niche my clients want to see that my sites have PR before dealing with me, this is proof of what I do works to them.

[Kevin pitt]

Yes PR does matter as it is helpful to get quality backlinks.high pr sites have always been priority for the search engine optimization purpose.

[Barry Unruh]

The point OutWest and Yukon both have made is very valid about PR...Just look...



As you can see, there are sites with less PR and less backlinks which have obtained higher rankings.

If you take the trouble to analyze their backlinks though you will find the ones with less backlinks and less PR which are higher ranked have a higher average PR backlink coming to their site with more targeted anchor text.

In what both Yukon and OutWest said they are not negating the importance of PR from backlinks, but pointing out the fact that PR of your page is NOT a big contributing factor to your OWN page ranking highly.