How much importance the Google Page Rank holds

Google PageRank was once considered to be all end all of SEO. The PageRank algorithm was designed for finding out the websites that matter and for enabling them to rank accordingly on the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). The Google PageRank algorithm was the first algorithm that is used by Google and is the best known because of this only.

However, when it comes to Google PageRank then there come two different thoughts whether it still matters, or it has been dead now. But, here we are discussing about some of the arguments against Google PageRank today, and why Google PageRank still matters to SEO experts or digital marketers. But before diving deep into the discussion, let’s first learn more about Google PageRank...

The Evolution of Google PageRank

Google PageRank got its title from the name of the co-founder of Google, “Larry Page”. With his co-founder Sergey Brin, Larry Page implemented the PageRank algorithm in order to measure “how many incoming links there are on a website?” It was created for getting a rough estimate of which pages have authority over other pages.

In a nutshell, the more links are there means the more people must be finding the data relevant.

The first worldwide PageRank consumer experience was at the time when the Google search engine was launched in 1998. And, at that time the proprietary eponym “Google it!” was born.

At that time the digital marketers, as well as the consumers alike could use the scaled display to evaluate the website’s rankings on Google. Within the shorter period of time, it became an obsession that leads to unethical practices to abuse the system.

Let’s first discuss about the arguments that came against the Google PageRank...

The Arguments against Google PageRank

In 2016, Google finally killed the PageRank toolbar after nearly two decades. The main argument against Google PageRank is that the PageRank brought out the people who were looking to make a quick links for showing a fake positive PageRank. Moreover, it shifted the focus from creating quality content to aiming for the quantity of low-quality links.

After all, if someone could spend a day in putting out 20 low-quality articles filled with no. of links rather than writing one high-quality article in the same time then, why wouldn’t he do that?

The business of buying and selling low quality links for a PageRank boost was detracting the original goal of Google’s toolbar notification. The goal of Google’s toolbar was to inform consumers when they were on a high-quality, relevant, and safe site.

As a consequence, the spam websites, as well as the scam artists were ranking higher because of the unethical practices they followed. And the most people were happy to see just the higher PageRank.

The Arguments that agreed with Google PageRank

Although, the Google PageRank is no longer a publicly used visual aid, However, the link building has a lot of merit when it comes to SEO.

Over the recent years, Google has come up with more algorithms in place to capture the mindless link building or the ones who have valued the quantity over quality.

Then they begin to consider the metrics like your website’s bounce rate, time spent on a page, clicks, page views, and conversions. These indirectly assess the quality of your website along with the content quality.

These algorithms make it less likely for consumers to be tricked into visiting the low-quality websites.

The main argument for Google PageRank is that although PageRank is no longer publicly visible but, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

Moreover, Google has also implemented the systems that can detect ‘if you have hundreds of spam links, rather than quality backlinks”. And if it detects this issue, you will quickly find your website missing from the SERP, no matter how high you have ranked beforehand.

How to boost your PageRank in the Right Way?

There are several ways to improve SEO with the Google PageRank and that too without abusing the system & escaping yourself from getting penalized from Google bots. Please have a look at some of those techniques.

No follow links & Page Sculpting:

Google introduced the nofollow links which is a way to link to other websites but without sharing a piece of you website rating. Therefore, when a nofollow link is used during a citation, Google will not follow the link when crawling over your data.

Many websites then opt to use the nofollow links for internal content as well as for the external ones. In doing so, they are able to direct search engine results to the websites with the potential to convert customers and only these websites will be shown on the SERP. That means they can still have internal links to decrease their bounce rate but will drive traffic to the pages where it matters.

Natural Backlinks

If as a SEO Expert if you choose to use backlinks to boost your SEO, and you should because it’s still the prime metric, but you should do it with quality and care.

You need to ensure the websites that are linking to your website are not spam or low-risk. Therefore, the content that links to your website should be naturally worded and it shouldn’t be a list of links because it will inevitably get penalized by Google.

Implied Links

Implied links are though a relatively new aspect of PageRank, here instead of just direct links you need to have your business name mentioned in an article which is counted as an implied link. Google also assess the tone of the website which you have posted an article on to determine if your site is being referenced with a positive, negative, or neutral tone.

PageRank Matters

The controversy regarding the importance of PageRank has died down but, the concept behind the algorithm is still important and plays an important role directly into your SEO.

Therefore, it is advised that rather than relying on a toolbar, you should use your Google analytics and keyword optimization tools for creating high-quality content to support your organic traffic. And at times when you look for the link building opportunities, you must target high-quality websites and content that helps you in improving your ratings overall.