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Google Changing the PageRank Algorithm?

By Daniel 378 Comments Reading Time: 2 minutes

Background Image

If things keep at this pace I might rename this blog to Daily Google Tips. Over the last two weeks we have been talking about Google every other day. This time it is the PageRank buzz again.

Both Problogger and Copyblogger, two of the most popular blogs on the niche, announced that their PR dropped from 6 to 4. Previously other authority blogs confirmed that they lost PR, but the suspect was towards paid links. Given that Problogger and Copyblogger are not selling links, it might be just a readjustment on the PR scale.

Some people are arguing that since the PR drop is not generalized, it must be a slap from Google due to practices that conflict with its guidelines. Andy Beard suggested that the sites that got penalized were either selling links or exchanging them inside large blog networks. This is a feasible explanation given that most of the Weblogs, Inc blogs (Engadget above all) were penalized, and they do not sell paid links either.

Here is a list that I gathered with big blogs that supposedly lost PR on this issue:

  • Statcounter (from 10 to 6)
  • Engadget (from 7 to 5)
  • AutoBlog (from 6 to 4)
  • Problogger (from 6 to 4)
  • Copyblogger (from 6 to 4)
  • AdesBlog (from 7 to 5)
  • Search Engine Journal (from 7 to 4)
  • Quick Online Tips (from 6 to 3)
  • Search Engine Roundtable (from 7 to 4)
  • Blog Herald (from 6 to 4)
  • Weblog Tools Collection (from 6 to 4)
  • JohnTP (from 6 to 4)
  • Coolest Gadgets (from 5 to 3)
  • CyberNet News (from 6 to 4)

Update: It looks like mainstream websites that were selling links were also penalized:

  • Washington Post (from 7 to 5)
  • Washington Times (from 6 to 4)
  • Charlotte Observer (from 6 to 4)
  • Forbes.com (from 7 to 5)
  • SFGate.com (from 7 to 5)
  • Sun Times (from 7 to 5)
  • New Scientist (from 7 to 5)
  • Seattle Times (from 6 to 4)

Update 2: After reading through the avalanche of posts on the subject, it appears that this is not a PageRank update but rather a distribution of penalties (either automatic or manual). The theory that the penalized blogs were either selling links or part of a network that used a cross-linking strategy seems to hold.

Google Changing The Pagerank Algorithm? Photo

About Daniel

Daniel Scocco is a programmer and entrepreneur located in São Paulo, Brazil. His first company, Online Profits, builds and manages websites in different niches. His second company, Kubic, specializes in developing mobile apps for the iOS and Android platforms.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Avatar Of DaveDave says

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    I don’t worry about Google. Google is not the law and its policies and vagaries are virtually ignored by the media and by every established corporation and every big advertising agency in the world. Except among bloggers and SEO parasites, Google’s webmaster policies are never news.

    The online world of Google is an unhealthy environment. I’d rather be hiking.

    Reply
  2. Avatar Of AndyAndy says

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    Its interesting topic about the google PR slap. I have noticed PR increase in many of the sites I own while reading others have PR drop.

    Reply
  3. Avatar Of Rick WezenaarRick Wezenaar says

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    People, Randy, then I have _some_ ‘news’ for you,

    Somehow, and I really don’t know why, my site dropped from a pr4 to pr0.

    No, I don’t sell links or whatever. I am sometimes busy on blogcatalog and technorati and mybloglog, etc.etc. to link up with people who are in my specific line of work (photography). I also have a lot of ‘fans’ who are linking to me, and yes, most of them get a link back from me. I think in the last week I added about 10 new links on my site, where it was quiet a few weeks before that because I was on a holiday for quite some time (Indonesia, see my blog for photos). My technorati rank rose from 18 to 34 in the last couple of days, probably because of all the new links pointing to my articles. Seems people like my work.

    But somehow the people from Google don’t like my photography. I recently applied for adsense on my page. didn’t have anything at the time. I got a nasty mail back that my blog was’nt worth their while and was rejected from adsense (and no, I don’t do porn stuff, just landscapes, culture, and people :P)

    Immediately after that mail my pagerank dropped from pr4 to pr0. I am not sure whether it had to do with my application for adsense and their rejection, but I think it is rather suspicious, even if they were ‘updating’…

    penalty ? for what ? because I have beautiful photography on my site (which is my own work, so it isn’t any copyright violation 😛 [mental note: write lawyer to sue myself], or because I have added too many links in a week’s time ? (and others to me for that fact…)

    Well, so sorry people from Google, that I am an enthousiastic blogger.

    I use google regularly (and I think almost everybody does) to look up things on their search engine. However, now that they are clearly so biased in their attitude towards bloggers or enthousiasts, I am now searching for competing alternatives. There are not many, unfortunately.

    Rick Wezenaar
    photographer

    ps. Next to my photography I am also an experienced UNIX Consultant. I recently got an invitation to work with google, because my skillset matched with one of their positions. I am not sorry I didn’t accept the offer…

    Reply
  4. Avatar Of MervtMervt says

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    I just finished a brand new site and it now has a pr4 rating overnight.

    Reply
  5. Avatar Of MarvinMarvin says

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    Does G re-scaling the keywords also Im busted all of my keywords dropped!

    Reply
  6. Avatar Of XmcpXMCP says

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    Hey,
    Good article. I hope you don’t mind, but I borrowed your list of affected sites for my explanation of the pagerank changes. I did give a backlink though, but god knows, that might be dangerous nowadays 😉
    -XMCP
    PS: If you feel like taking a look, the article is over at

    Reply
  7. Avatar Of Eric StollerEric Stoller says

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    This has been the highest traffic month for my site. I checked my Google PageRank and it went from “5” to “1”!!! I still have sections of my site with PR’s of 2, 3, and 4. One of my client sites went from “0” to “5”.

    I am really confused. In the end I just hope this does not affect my SERPs…

    Reply
  8. Avatar Of Chipseochipseo says

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    There was so much talk about this I wasn’t going to post anything on my blog about it, until I found out mine went from a PR0 to a PR2.

    Up two is not bad considering so many lost PR’s, but then again, I couldn’t have gone below a PR0 anyway.

    Reply
  9. Avatar Of ElizabethElizabeth says

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    My two year old blog Table for Five went from PR4 to PR3. But, my six month old blog MomReviews went UP from PR0 to PR2, and my five month old blog MomCooks also went up from PR0 to PR2. I always thought that the age of the blog was one of the determining factors.

    The only explanation I can think of is that I sell Text Link Ads and LinkWorth ads on Table for Five. MomReviews has one multi-rotating ad running, and one affilliate ad. MomCooks has BlogHer Ads, Auction Ads, and Adsense. But, I’ve only written 42 posts on it! And yet it’s only one rank step away from a two year old blog with probably close to a thousand posts? It makes no sense.

    Reply
  10. Avatar Of Video YoutubeVideo youtube says

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    google.com.tr = pr 7
    omg..

    Reply
  11. Avatar Of Site EkleSite Ekle says

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    hmmm realy youtube pr 3 :S

    Reply
  12. Avatar Of CableguyCableGuy says

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    youtoube.com = PR3? What’s going on out there?

    Reply
  13. Avatar Of MarcusMarcus says

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    Holy s… One of My website suddenly drop from 5 to 2, have only Google ad sense ads, no link selling or buying, no text ads…
    It has quality content, many visitors and instead of increase from PR5 –
    and got PR2?

    Reply
  14. Avatar Of Tim BoucherTim Boucher says

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    Ironically, on one of the sites offering a PR calculator tool, there is an AdSense ad for Text-Link-Ads!

    Reply
  15. Avatar Of Nonenone says

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    youtube.com PR > 3

    Reply
  16. Avatar Of RogersRogers says

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    This all suggest that Google don’t want to remove page rank from toolbar as G fear that most of webmasters will then uninstall their toolbar

    But at the same time G want to convey that PR is no that important as it used to be earlier… This si to prevent link selling business…

    Reply
  17. Avatar Of OkinawaOkinawa says

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    Wow, this madness has been the buzz of like every forum I visit!

    Reply
  18. Avatar Of DanielDaniel says

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    It looks like its a real update now, with sites actually gaining PR.

    Reply
  19. Avatar Of Internet Marketing BlueprintsInternet Marketing Blueprints says

    at

    Reply
  20. Avatar Of MotomaMotoma says

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    Google: “You probably already know about Amazon, Engadget, Ebay, CNet, 4Chan, Wikipedia, and Jesusishitler.com; so we are going to give you results that you may not have known about, but that are equally as relevant.”

    Reply
  21. Avatar Of DanielDaniel says

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    Tim, not yet.

    Reply
  22. Avatar Of Tim BoucherTim Boucher says

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    Is Google addressing this publicly yet?

    Reply
  23. Avatar Of Wiadomoå›CiWiadomoÅ›ci says

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    One of my old domain dropped pagerank form 5 to 3 too 🙁

    Reply
  24. Avatar Of Househouse says

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    How is it possible that an index page has disappeared from Google result after being on the first page for 1 year?

    Reply
  25. Avatar Of DanielDaniel says

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    I would say that a hundred of them at least. I saw a lot of small bloggers complaining as well.

    Reply
  26. Avatar Of AnandAnand says

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    Any idea on the total number of websites that lost their PR?

    Reply
  27. Avatar Of Different Story Here...Different Story here... says

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    I have stayed the same….

    But, incoming links have increased and traffic is steady…

    Reply
  28. Avatar Of AlbertAlbert says

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    Well, they dropped mine from PR7 to PR4. I have checked with Text Link Ads and of course they say this is not going to affect their/our business.

    Has anyone noticed a change after removing their paid links?

    Reply
  29. Avatar Of Michael HamptonMichael Hampton says

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    My site also dropped from PR6 to PR4, though I’ve seen only about a 5% drop in traffic over the last month.

    Interestingly, I sort of knew something like this was coming since my AdSense revenues have been down almost 50% over the last month. Fortunately it is not my sole source of income.

    Reply
  30. Avatar Of Tim BoucherTim Boucher says

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    I’ve emailed Patrick Gavin, CEO of Text-Link-Ads about this, who I did some consulting for back when they first started out. Curious to see what their public response will be.

    Seems like a humongous bonehead move on the part of Google; they’re only creating reasons for influential tech sites not to use their services anymore. This is the kind of thing I’m willing to drop everything I have with them over.

    Reply
  31. Avatar Of Japanese Seo - Ƶ·å¤–SeoJapanese SEO - 海外SEO says

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    Very surprised at the big change.
    Thank you for the fast info.

    Reply
  32. Avatar Of SeoreefSeoReef says

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    I don’t think it was a Google PR update. To me it looks like it was hand edited penalties.

    Reply
  33. Avatar Of EklavyaEklavya says

    at

    Reply
  34. Avatar Of Toxa931toxa931 says

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    HA-HA

    Reply
  35. Avatar Of DanielDaniel says

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    emigre, I am not sure if this was a proper update or just a manual adjustment for the mentioned blogs. If it was an update than all other blogs still got see some PR change.

    Reply
  36. Avatar Of Emigreemigre says

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    If the update is over, I didn’t see any change in my PRs. I hope it is.

    Another big blog to be hit with a double whammy is Entrepreneurs Journey. From 6 to 5 and now it’s a 4.
    AdesBlog went from a 7 straight to 5.

    Reply
  37. Avatar Of FlantureFlanture says

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    My blog has also suffered and it was downgraded from PR5 to PR3.

    Reply
  38. Avatar Of Robert MacewanRobert MacEwan says

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    My site has dropped from PR6 to PR5, but suspect this is due to my switch from Ubuntu Linux content to discussioning my mother-in-law purposefully losing my socks which handling laundry & other family related posts.

    😉

    Reply
  39. Avatar Of Phill MidwinterPhill Midwinter says

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    I’m a search engine engineer and I’m going to give you some free advice: Ignore PageRank.

    It hasn’t been used for a long time and they change it now and again to make those who know little about how the algorithms and weightings of various web pages work have kittens now and again.

    All it is these days is a useful little tool to keep people in suspense. Just ignore it.

    Reply
  40. Avatar Of ClementClement says

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    Hey guys

    Why do yoiu get concerned about this PR issue?It is just a number. Concentrate on writing great posts on your blog.Google friendly blogs (those with high PR) will link to them.Google will end up bringing you traffic through tthem.

    Reply
  41. Avatar Of SuraySuray says

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    I think Google has edited the PageRank scores of several sites in manually. I was so curious, Google didn’t update the PageRank of all sites in 3 or 4 months. It’s being 5 months, Google has late, if Google implementing new algorithm, I think that all webmasters and SEO will use more powerful and significant strategies to sneakily cheat the Google crawler. Unless, if Google is using human-edited way. I have written about this at

    Reply
  42. Avatar Of Markmark says

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    Ouch. From a 7 to a 4?!?! Wow. I’m shocked at that big drop.

    Reply
  43. Avatar Of Sridhar KatakamSridhar Katakam says

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    Mine went down from 5 to 3.

    Reply
  44. Avatar Of CeciliaCecilia says

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    Interesting reading…I’m glad I haven’t started my blog yet. Being a slow learner sometimes pays off, I guess. I have no worries with PR…oh, yes! I do…I don’t even know where to find that magic #. I should probably check if my empty blog space’s title has been ranked. Wouldn’t that be hilarious?

    Procrastination bug, or is it the gutless bug? That is what sucks…not the PR 1, not even PR 0!

    Reply
  45. Avatar Of Jeffrey HendersonJeffrey Henderson says

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    No problems here, still a 7.

    Reply
  46. Avatar Of RustyRusty says

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    Maybe its time for a new boss. Let the people speak.

    Reply
  47. Avatar Of JohnJohn says

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    It’s funny how Matt’s buddy Mr. Wolf did not get hit even thought he has a text-link-ads ad on his front page. I think google is out of control with this. They need to stop hounding sites which people REALLY READ like this, andy wash post etc. And start worring about the 1000’s of scraper adsense pages that fill up the google blog serps, and other directories.

    Just my opinion thought. I wish a boycott of google would do any good. But prob not. They are officially the 300lb gorilla now.

    Reply
  48. Avatar Of ArmenArmen says

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    Sorry Daniel, I missed that little “it might be just a readjustment on the PR scale” phrase.

    It definately is interesting. I would say that we’re better just to sit tight, and wait till more is revealed, however, you’ve just landed yourself a serious piece of ‘linkbait’ here by writing about it 😉

    Reply
  49. Avatar Of DanielDaniel says

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    Armen, I raised that hypothesis on the post in fact.

    It could be, but it should not take that much time for most of the sites to start showing a PR change.

    As the time passes I am more skeptical about that option.

    Reply
  50. Avatar Of ArmenArmen says

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    How about this Daniel…with the boom in blogs, and all the linking increase, maybe Google are making the bar to reach certain levels of PageRank, higher? Maybe it’s just a matter of time before all PR’s go down, and that will then level out the competition.
    That might help with understanding why the actual SERP’s haven’t really changed.

    Reply
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