The higher the PR the higher the backlinks, the higher the backlinks the better the SERPS.
That's how i see it.

Then you see it backwards.. The more / better backlinks you have the higher your toolbar PR could be.. Not the other way around..

PR is important, but it is still possible for lower PR sites to advance in SERPs over higher PR sites so it's not everything that determines your SERP. There are over 200 factors that determine your rank.

PR shuffles around b/c Google constantly changes it's algo in determining how to calculate PR. This is reflected in PR changes every couple of months.

If pagerank weren't important - Google would just stop using it.

Still you will find lots of people who will tell you that it's not important - you really have to decide this one on your own.. you either WANT some, or you don't!

Your pagerank drops as links that you have lose their rank, or links that you have die, or Google changes the threshold of links required to achieve a certain pagerank - which seems to have happened recently (but don't tell anyone )

James

Page Rank is as important as you want it to be. I care about the SERP's and conversions.

If pagerank weren't important - Google would just stop using it.

It is TOOLBAR PR that is of no use whatsoever.
REAL PR, the one that Google uses internally, the one that we have no idea of the real range or it's numerical value at all, the one that the toolbar value is only a exported integer value of, is the important one.

AND If you had a USP that has served YOU as well as PageRank has served Google in getting them noticed in the early days, would YOU dump it?

It gets Google talked about every minute of every day somewhere. Now be honest, wouldn't you love to have something like that for your business?

Originally Posted by chrishirst

It is TOOLBAR PR that is of no use whatsoever.

Yes it is.
1. Site owners can see approximate back link value of their site (if they need to know, whatever is the reason for that). they heard that Google have PR and what is it for, they read it here:
http://www.google.com/corporate/tech.html
"PageRank Technology: PageRank reflects our view of the importance of web pages by considering more than 500 million variables and 2 billion terms. Pages that we believe are important pages receive a higher PageRank and are more likely to appear at the top of the search results."
Word of some SEO's, SEM's against big G's word...
2. Some webmasters send me e-mails how my articles are good and they would link to them, but they will do that when the page get some PR...It is nice in that kind of situations to have some toolbar PR. I know there will be some eventually, but for some people it is more important than content itself for their visitors...
3. Until there are PR in toolbar, there will be webmasters that give it high value. They will buy, sell, refuse links, banners exchanges, linking to articles etc, and that is the great influence on internet structure....

Originally Posted by chrishirst

REAL PR, the one that Google uses internally, the one that we have no idea of the real range or it's numerical value at all, the one that the toolbar value is only a exported integer value of, is the important one.

Well, toolbar PR is a glimpse ("exported integer value of") to real PR. Regardless of time delay for updating toolbat PR, if you don't have real PR available, glimpse only (toolbat PR), can be useful info.

Originally Posted by chrishirst

AND If you had a USP that has served YOU as well as PageRank has served Google in getting them noticed in the early days, would YOU dump it?

I agree with this, but also PageRank Technology is the base for their search tehnology, removing it from public could have effects for not only webmasters but for competitors, stockholders, press....explaining why did they remove PR.
If they say that it is not important or webmasters have used PR to buy sell links, unnatural link exchanges that could effect rankings, what would that say about Google, that they are venerable? They don't want that ....

Originally Posted by chrishirst

It gets Google talked about every minute of every day somewhere. Now be honest, wouldn't you love to have something like that for your business?

I agree with this... while people are talking about PR and it's importance they are including algorithms and technology that rank sites and they are not open about it as for PR....

IMO, PR is important coz it somehow gives you a hint on how you're doing link building for your site but I care more about my SERPs ranking

Originally Posted by djura

1. Site owners can see approximate back link value of their site (if they need to know, whatever is the reason for that). they heard that Google have PR and what is it for

How exactly do you define "Backlink value"??? What does PR have to do with it?

Originally Posted by djura

2. Some webmasters send me e-mails how my articles are good and they would link to them, but they will do that when the page get some PR...It is nice in that kind of situations to have some toolbar PR.

If other Webmasters don't want to link to useful pages, that's their loss. PageRank doesn't change the Content or Code of a webpage, it remains exactly the same, with or without PR.

Originally Posted by djura

but for some people it is more important than content itself for their visitors...

, Just which "visitors" is PR more important for?

Originally Posted by djura

3. Until there are PR in toolbar, there will be webmasters that give it high value. They will buy, sell, refuse links, banners exchanges, linking to articles etc, and that is the great influence on internet structure....

So just because everyone else does it, you should too? (Not you specifically, but a webmaster looking to do business in those areas.)

If they can't tell the difference between a useful and useless webpage without PR calculations, should they really be conducting web business in the first place?

Why not look at REAL factors that affect your websites? (Visitor counts, conversion rates, etc.)

if "page rank" was so useless, then why does google still display it

I agree you shouldn't focus everything on PR, but it does have it's place and no matter how many times you say it doesn't, it will continue to show..

Just imagine how refreshing it can be to not place ANY focus on Toolbar PR. You (and your website) will be much better off once that happens.

Originally Posted by Brandon

if "page rank" was so useless, then why does google still display it

Probably for brand marketing purposes.

Originally Posted by jamestl2

Just imagine how refreshing it can be to not place ANY focus on Toolbar PR. You (and your website) will be much better off once that happens.



Probably for brand marketing purposes.

ha, ya because all the ppl that use google even know what "page rank" is

it's mostly a webmaster term, so I strongly doubt they are still using it just because it's brand recognition

and I don't pay attention to pr for my sites, I focus on traffic

Originally Posted by webcosmo

It does have importance somewhat considering its a ranking from an authority site like Google.

You are correct again.

If it was not important Google would not bother with it.

Here is a quote from Google

• PageRank Technology: PageRank reflects our view of the importance of web pages by considering more than 500 million variables and 2 billion terms. Pages that we believe are important pages receive a higher PageRank and are more likely to appear at the top of the search results.
  PageRank also considers the importance of each page that casts a vote, as votes from some pages are considered to have greater value, thus giving the linked page greater value. We have always taken a pragmatic approach to help improve search quality and create useful products, and our technology uses the collective intelligence of the web to determine a page's importance.

Google Technology

Originally Posted by chrishirst

Google Technology

what's the point of this post?
google has 100's of goofy pages like this

Originally Posted by homebizseo

You are correct again.

If it was not important Google would not bother with it.

Here is a quote from Google

and where in that paragraph does it mention "toolbar page rank"???

that refers to internal page rank techniques.

I don't think there's any differences between 3,4,5, but when your PR is up to 7,8,9, that works.

PageRank is like points on who's line is it any way, it doesn't matter.

I have stopped even using it for link exchange evaluation. When I am going to exchange links with a website I look at: Is it related, is the content quality or keyword stuffed or from an article site, does the site look like the owner cares about it (its not a one hour job that they won't ever touch again), and even a nice design. Basically, is the site a quality helpful site. I have decided all of this after my websites recieve garbage page rank after doing good link building. Why should my site be deranked to PR1 after doing steady good link building and the next guy's "spam-keyword-widget-viagra.com using stock wordpress theme that has backlinks from hacked forum posts" site is PR5.

Originally Posted by rolda hayes

and where in that paragraph does it mention "toolbar page rank"???

that refers to internal page rank techniques.

Toolbar page rank is important. Google values PR. Google states that in many times over. The counterargument that PR is not important goes against all logic. I think I would put more value in Google than the hundreds of so called SEO Gurus found in many forums.

http://www.brianwhite.org/2007/06/
http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/001214.html
http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/more-info-on-pagerank/

http://groups.google.com/group/Googl...6bd3ebe4031dd1
4 or 5 posts down.