Feels like more than a Super Typhoon, Google finally blew this blog’s remaining PageRank (PR) to dust: from PR2 to PR0. Now, the changes just took place three days since it reduced my PR4 to PR2. What the heck is going on with Google PageRank technology? While I’m not focusing my writings to build a PageRank (PR) anymore, Google is still the master of search engines and my blog’s traffic and reputation highly relies on it. However, their PageRank technology stinks: it’s out of schedule, it’s show-stopper, and definitely depressing.

Google Holds Us In The Neck

Whether we like it or not, Google holds the necks of bloggers and a lot of site owners as they can just easy implement contradictory algorithms without even announcing and realizing the impact of it to many people and their lives. We know that Google penalizes sites who sell links, and since that method is just one of best ways for bloggers to earn online out of their writing efforts, that’s a show stopper for us bloggers who work hard. Unfortunately, despite many efforts to rival the famed PageRank (PR),  it is still counts because lots of advertisers still have faith on it. Now, after all humors and having the first-hand experience, I could strongly say that it isn’t the measure of anything, not even any blogger’s reputation. It’s Google’s tool on how they want to manipulate the Web and in order to respect on it, you have to follow their own bureaucracies.

People behind Google should realize that they don’t own the Internet. If their guidelines try to affect the lives of those who work hard as bloggers and web developers by blowing off their PRs considering they have done nothing harmful to the society, then it’s best that they back off. I just hope that they find a way to improve their services and make things more transparent. They should provide a PageRank homepage or forum or any channel on their site to:

• show when exactly they will update the PageRank gauge on Google Toolbar
• communicate with site owners and bloggers with issues regarding their PageRank service and letting them know, reaching them about the impact of their technology on these people’s lives
• they let sites know what’s wrong with their contents when they lower down the site’s PR
• announce what changes in algorithms they do so that site owners can adjust their contents and optimize their codes for search engines in ethical ways

That’s all I can say Google! Trust me today, you made me feel how unfortunate I am. I would like to experience Super Typhoon Jangmi than you blowing my PageRank away just like that without an explanation!

I was speechless today when I saw that this blog’s Google PageRank (PR) shrunk from PR4 to PR2. I just got PR4 two months ago and I can still remember the post that I did and how happy I was to see that. It seems that Google’s Toolbar update today was pretty much out of schedule as they are known to update PageRank gauge every three to four months. This blog used to get PR 3 last April, then it rose to PR 4 last July 26, and now that my PR moved again (or slapped) to 2 — I realized it’s just been two months since the last update? What say you, Google?

Many bloggers are aware that Google likes to slap the PageRank of blogs and sites that sell links or do sponsored writings or reviews. Many believed that the fluctuations in Google Toolbar PR gauge are caused by the frequent change with their PageRank algorithms, others believe there are forbidden keywords that Google uses to identify paid links or paid posts — but how come the sites associated with Internet marketing communities are usually the ones who had their PRs taken away? Bloggers know that higher PR entices advertisers and promotes blog income. And whether Google likes it or not, in many ways blog income motivates bloggers to write more quality contents. Unfortunately here comes Google, the show stopper. I’ve come with a new resolve.

My Resolve: Don’t Blog For Google, Blog For People

Now I’ve renewed my resolve and cause to write for this blog: I will now write for people, not for Google. I guess it’s best that way (at least I’m not like a dog getting crazy following and finding ways on how to please the so-called Internet god, Google. Google may have struck my PR today, however it can’t move my zeal and vigor to write on this blog.

So what say you, Google?

Wikipedia defines PageRank (PR) as:

…a link analysis algorithm that assigns a numerical weighting to each element of a hyperlinked set of documents, such as the World Wide Web, with the purpose of “measuring” its relative importance within the set. The algorithm may be applied to any collection of entities with reciprocal quotations and references.

Benefits of PageRank

The first benefit of having a good PR if you are a website or blog owner is that advertisers start to notice you. The higher your PR, the more attractive you are to advertisers — this is a thumb rule. Now that this blog acquires PR 3, it has greater chance to make some money for whatever purpose it may serve best. Well, hopefully. I still need to exert more efforts and be consistent in pleasing my audience with my blog articles.

Another benefit of Google PageRank is during appraisal. If I decide to sell this domain, for example, I can use Google PR to determine the selling price of my website, along with my Alexa Traffic ranking, among others.

How Did I Build My PageRank

What I did basically was to provide good content. I did quality reviews in my previous posts and other sites seem to like them and they linked to my pages. Whenever they link to this blog’s pages, it is like they cast a vote for this blog to build a PR. This is how Google sees things on the Web for their PR technology.

During my five months of blogging, I also met new friends from the blogosphere and we ended up having our links exchanged. They added my blog’s link in their blog rolls and mentioned me somewhere on their blogs. What they did contributed as well to my current Google PR, which is good.

My Personal Standpoint

While the scale of PageRank (PR) ranges from 0 to 10, having a PR of 3 is fair enough for a start. For sure, there is more work ahead to increase the PR on its next update sometime this year. But for now, I want to thank Google for my score!

Theoretically the answer is “no.” Moving from one host to another does not affect SEO. However, if you are not careful enough and you fail to follow instructions your sites could face risks of defeating your SEO. The impact largely depends on the actual transition process from your old host to a new one but utmost it depends on you.

Downtime is commonly the major issue you may face when you change to a new web host.

Downtimes, for sure, are not healthy for your search engine-optimized websites, especially when it is prolonged. During downtimes, search engine spiders fail to crawl your site’s web pages and thus affect your pages’ SERP ranking when the search engine begins to re-index all downloaded pages by spiders to provide fast searches. Downtime is commonly the major issue you may face when you change your host. The good thing is that the chance of experiencing a downtime can be prevented. A good host would always suggest the following steps to provide your sites a smooth and transparent transition from your old to new host:

1. If you are moving a domain name to your new host as well, unlock your domain name from your old host/ registrar and provide your new host the EPP/authorization code. This will let them initiate domain name transfer request to your old host/registrar. If you are only moving a site or sites between hosts and does not involve domain name registrars, proceed to Step 2.
2. Set up your website on your new web host. Begin by adding your domain name in your new host’s control panel. Copy all your files to appropriate domain folder and copy necessary databases from your old host to your new host to “mirror” your existing website. You can test/view the files you upload to your new host by typing into your browser your domain name alias. If you don’t know about this, ask your new host’s live chat support.
3. Change your domain’s name server configuration (DNS) and point it to your new web host. After completing this step, your site should still be accessible online and still running from your old web host while the new DNS settings are propagating on the Internet.

The common pitfall in the process is when you take down the site on the old web host while the DNS is still propagating – definitely it would cause downtime for your site. It’s when the SEO risks come in. To prevent that to happen, keep your website files on your old web host for one week. This ample time lets the DNS propagation to complete which can be identified by monitoring where your website files are pointing to. If your domain is finally pointing to the files on your new web host, then the site transfer is done and complete. You can now take down the site from your old web host and enjoy the services of your new web host preserving your site’s PR rank and SERP position.