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Google’s Latest Slap

Posted by Mike | October 31, 2007 .

If you haven’t noticed, there was a major Google PageRank update in recent days. It looks like the update is finally over, and consensus is that Google slapped websites that were selling links to manipulate PR.

In other words if your site has high PR and you’ve been selling text links to pass that PR to other sites, there’s a good chance your own PR just took a hit.

Why?

The folks at Google have made it known for some time that buying and selling links to manipulate PR is a no-no. This PR update is a slap on the wrist to let you know they’re on to you. If you don’t stop your PR may drop again with the next update. Or they might just drop you from their results altogether.

Of course the PR that you see in the Google toolbar is not an accurate representation of your current PageRank. The toolbar is only updated a few times a year, and even then it is considered a few months behind. Your true PR will be higher or lower than that at any given time.

I pay almost no attention to PR at all. It’s nice to see it go up, but I don’t kill myself if it doesn’t. Since I just started this blog, it looks like I just missed the update so I’ll have no PR until the next one. But that’s fine, because I’m more focused on ranking well in the SEs and generating traffic than I am on gaining PR.

If your goal is to build a long term business to support yourself and your family, you need to set priorities and focus on building a strong foundation rather than obsessing over some arbitrary number in a toolbar.