Comments on: Blogroll and Google

By: How important are blogrolls? | Independent Fashion Bloggers

How important are blogrolls? | Independent Fashion Bloggers — Wed, 13 May 2009 14:10:25 +0000

[...] Blogroll and Google [...]

By: Patrick

Patrick — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 09:26:31 +0000

Hi Melinda,

Yes, it works the way I explain it here, as far as I know. Keep in mind too that like any computer program, Google often has bugs and is dealing with a lot of data, so sometimes it just works better than other times. Just because you do everything right or wrong, doesn’t necessarily mean Google will notice right away or will do what you expect. Sometimes it’s all a little bit random. I’ve noticed a big increase in traffic too, and it may just be Google is working a little better at the moment.

I’m now a PR6, and my conclusion was I simply could not go from a 5 to a 6 without taking nearly all static links off the front of my blog, and this is why I made that change. Instead now I make links in posts and have a separate links page. I think this is probably true with you too, if going to 6 is what you want to do.

Just because you do everything right doesn’t necessarily mean you will get a PR6. I have incoming links from several PR6s and PR7s, and probably without similar links you will stay at a 5 no matter what you do.

By: Melinda

Melinda — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 01:52:37 +0000

Patrick, I want to let you know I’m still totally fascinated by this. I have been getting a lot more hits lately and a lot more Google referrals as well, and just checked my page rank and it’s now 5. So it really does bring more traffic!

Have you found your new scheme to be working?

By: VP

VP — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:10:05 +0000

This is the best PR explanation and conversation I’ve seen so far and I’m glad to find my own conclusions were broadly right. Too bad I had to go through the pain of reading some most boring techie websites to get to the same place as you!

Yes PR is a bit of a double edged sword: we need it to find the (supposedly) good stuff and for others to have a chance to find us, but there can be quite a bit of pain in the process.

And when we do get the increase in traffic, that can bring attendant issues too e.g. if a 3-fold increase in traffic results in a 3-fold increase in comments, how long can the more ‘personal’ relationships be maintained before blogging becomes a chore?

The answer to that will partly depend on why we blog in the first place…

By: Links | Bifurcated Carrots

Links | Bifurcated Carrots — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 13:15:08 +0000

[...] to move most of my links onto a separate page, to unclutter the front of the blog and make it more Google friendly. You can see the links page I’m working on as a link off the front page of the [...]

By: How important are blogrolls?

How important are blogrolls? — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 20:07:36 +0000

[...] Blogroll and Google [...]

By: laura

laura — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 16:22:16 +0000

Nor worries patrick no intention of taking anyone off because they have a low PR. non that I read anyway seem to have less than 3 and the ones that rate 0 must be an error.
fascinating topic thanks for posting.

By: Patrick

Patrick — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 11:39:24 +0000

Thanks everyone for the comments!

Laura:

I should have made this clear from the start, but I don’t use the site I linked to above myself to lookup PR. It’s possible it doesn’t work well. Sorry about that!

The only way I know how to get PR information directly from Google is to install their toolbar on your browser, which shows you the PR of every page you visit. I don’t particularly recommend everyone go out and install this on your computer just to see PR, only if you are really serious about investigating PRs.

Whatever you do, don’t take Matron out of your blogroll for having a low PR, his is really PR4!

Cat:

See the next post!

By: Cat

Cat — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 18:58:58 +0000

I can just about upload, an then post pictures Patrick!! I am a complete technophobe, (but can make apple pie) but I did the check and mines a 3….better than a 2!! happy dayz. Any advice you have on anything Blog based would be rather welcome!! See ya, Cat x

By: Laura

Laura — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 16:07:25 +0000

Curious thing I tidied up my blogroll yesturday and just chucked the list in the checker today so I could point out which ones have a zero rating and try and understand why and now there is only one with a zero rating. Yesturday mustard plaster, Scarecrow’s Garden, permaculture reflections were all zero and today they have a score above Zero??? The only one left at zero is http://www.veggies-only.blogspot.com
So either there has been a mass tidy up in response to your post Patrick or this thing is a bit quirky -

By: Anthony

Anthony — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 14:34:25 +0000

I’ll all for updating your Blogrolls but you can link to whoever you want regardless of PR as long as you use Nofollow links.

Google doesn’t pass link juice through Nofollow links. Your blog is already using them for the comments (as most blogging software does).

And by the way, PR0 can also be a penalized site.

By: Doug Green

Doug Green — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 12:33:08 +0000

Far be it for me to claim to understand Google but what I do know is that there are a great many factors involved in creating page-ranking – and site-ranking. The page rank you’re referring to is site-wide. My impression is the real goal is to have individual page rankings do well on the primary search database in Google so you create traffic – and not be stuck in the supplementary databases. Site wide scores are only a small part of the weighting for each individual post is the way I understand it.

It still comes down to creating useful content for readers – do that and the Google-gawds will love you. Don’t do that and your bounce rate will kill you no matter what kind of linking out policies you have.

By: doviende

doviende — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 05:58:39 +0000

wow, thanks for the tips. i must admit i was rather clueless about pagerank. I still have memories of the old days when people would blatantly include tons of search terms in white text on white background.

i looked through my blogroll and kicked out a bunch of stale blogs that were PR2, so maybe that’ll move me back up to PR5 whenever they reassess me.

By: Content in a Cottage

Content in a Cottage — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 23:21:43 +0000

I have no idea what any of this means. When I search for my blog by name, it comes right up…that is all I can ask. I subscribe to google analytics so my sitemap is always current.

ANYWAY…I just found you on the Recommended Page for my Google Reader…so Google likes you!!! I have just added my subscription.

I recently made a wonderful free download for a SEED SAVER PACKET that you and your readers might like. My readers loved it. Here is the URL:

http://contentinacottage.blogspot.com/2008/09/free-download-seed-saving-envelope-for.html

I blog a lot about gardening. I will add you to my blogroll if you will add me to yours! Let me know. Thanks. ♥Rosemary

By: Lzyjo

Lzyjo — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 17:04:02 +0000

Great post, way more informative than Google’s own material! My page rank was at zero and then it jumped up to 3 suddenly. I will work to improve my blog roll. I have had great difficultly with the limitations of blogger, for instance, sitemaps. I haven’t found a way to add a sitemap to blogger to restrict the comments from being crawled. I fear “duplicate title” errors caused by the comments and archives may be hurting my page rank. Ugh! Sometimes, often, I hate Blogger.