The Irrelevance Of Google Page Rank

Google PageRank is a numerical measurement of a page's links and general quality, as judged by search engine algorithms. It is possible to view the PageRank of a page by using various online tools or the Google toolbar. For various reasons, though, it provides little value as a measurement of a page's true worth. Updated infrequently, it pays no heed to relevance and while it is considered by Google's indexing system, it is only one of many factors that are considered.

The toolbar PageRank (PR) is updated sporadically but typically only every three months. As such, when you view the PR of a page it could be outdated by up to three months. On occasion, it has even been six months between updates. During a Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) campaign, this period of time can make a big difference in ranking especially considering changes will essentially take effect straight away.

PR does not consider the relevancy of a page. This means that while a page may have a rank of 9, it will still not perform well for keywords it is not thoroughly optimised for. Similarly, lower ranking pages may still perform well for optimised keywords.

There are many more important measurements of a page's performance. Traffic levels, conversion rates, profits, and ranking positions for the most important keywords are the most positive aspects to consider and offer metrics that are far more advantageous to track and act upon than the Google toolbar PageRank. The most pertinent reason for this is page relevancy, making on page optimisation and link building the most important facets of SEO.