The controversy created over the topic of Google pagerank has been going on for years. With pagerank being updated every 3 months or so, the heated debate as to whether or not Google pagerank is something webmasters should focus on increasing, is a topic which you cannot escape from.
Everyone has their own opinion on this topic, many believe that other webmasters focus too much on increasing pagerank and lose site of the bigger picture. Actually gaining and increasing traffic whilst creating unique, quality content which people will feel forced to link too, because it is that good.
In earlier years I felt pagerank had a good reputation and the idea of ranking sites through the amount of links they received was a great idea. However recently I have started to lean more towards the idea that pagerank is a useless number which represents nothing about your website, therefore it means nothing and should not be worried about.
Now I have never worried too much over pagerank mainly because I would rather spend my time worrying over my sites traffic or marketing my website. Although I do find the idea of increasing links, to then increase your pagerank number to be entertaining, especially when it comes to the toolbar update. A period of time where stress levels reach an all time high, pagerank threads on forums go through the roof and experienced webmasters dish out there opinions of pagerank whilst noobs still believe pagerank is an almighty number and increasing pagerank is the one and only importance in creating and maintaining a website.
Most people have heard of the algorithm that Google supposedly uses to calculate a websites pagerank, I say supposedly as it never seems to be accurate. Since the last toolbar update I have realised fully that pagerank is useless, although I would love to have a full green bar at the top of my browser.
Google pagerank seems to pick numbers out of the bottom of a hat either that or this algorithm isn’t as useful as many people thought. Take the last toolbar update for example it was around the 26th July and I was reading many of the usual threads you see on Digital Point forums around the time of the pagerank update. Lots of members fussing over Google pagerank, anticipating the results however when they come stunned in confusion as to why there website with little or zero backlinks received a pagerank 2. Either this or confused because their website which was a pagerank 3 had more backlinks than last update but was demoted to a pagerank 2.
One of my own websites received a pagerank 2 now the home page was explainable however why the other 4 or 5 pages also received a pagerank 2 was beyond my own explanations.
I feel that Google pagerank has become very inaccurate perhaps it’s due to the growth of the internet and sites such as Digg and StumbleUpon where users can linkback to their own websites quite easily. I just feel that because there are so many variables that Google cannot on its own control the way that pagerank is calculated has been made obsolete and perhaps needs rewriting or restructuring.
Whats your view on Google pagerank, is it something you focus on increasing or something you completely ignore?
