Google’s latest page rank update left Blogging Mix with a BIG FAT ZERO PR! I am both guilty of doing sponsored posts and selling text link ads so this is something I was expecting to happen. What I didn’t expect is the sharp decline of offers to do sponsored reviews from advertisers.
When Blogging Mix was still a PR-4, offers to do sponsored post was abundant. I rejected about 60% percent of them because they are not relevant to blogging or because their offer was less than the minimum fee I charge for a review. After the page rank update, I only receive about 3-5 direct requests from advertisers to do a sponsored review. Most of my bids at SponsoredReviews have also been rejected, mainly because of issues concerning my page rank.
What Advertisers Need To Know About Google Page Rank
“PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page’s value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at considerably more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; for example, it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves “important” weigh more heavily and help to make other pages “important.” Using these and other factors, Google provides its views on pages’ relative importance.” - Google
From the explanation given by Google, it is clear that Google ranks PAGES of a website not the website as a whole. Therefore, my homepage (www.bloggingmix.com) can have a different page rank to the other pages of my blog (i.e. www.bloggingmix.com/advertise/).
I understand the importance of Google Page Rank to advertisers opting for text link ads at the homepage of a blog but I don’t see any reason why advertisers using sponsored posts as their marketing strategy should put so much emphasis on Google Page Rank.
For a start, bloggers use a new page of their blog to do the review. This means, the new page does not have a page rank yet. Assuming that links on a sponsored post were made dofollow, there’s little juice that advertisers get from them.
What’s Really Important In A Sponsored Review That Advertisers Should Look For
Although Sponsored Reviews can be used for Search Engine Optimization, it works best as a tool to improve an advertiser’s blog traffic and sales. Moreover, Sponsored Reviews as a way of search engine optimization is not in accordance to the policies prescribed by Google. This has resulted to Google taking action against publishers selling links by taking away their page rank or by excluding them from Google’s result page. That’s not all, Google is also hunting down advertisers who are engaged in buying links to boost their search engine rankings. This explains why most advertisers nowadays require non-disclosure of sponsored reviews done for them.
If you take Google page rank out of the equation, what’s really important in a sponsored review are traffic, conversion rate and feedback. Therefore, when using sponsored posts as a marketing strategy, advertisers should look for blogs -
- With good traffic - Alexa Traffic Rank is a useful tool to provide you an estimate of the traffic detail of a certain blog. You can also directly request for copies or screen shots of the statistics of the blog you wish to sponsor a post from.
- That are relevant to their products - Advertisers need to make sure that the blogs doing the sponsored review is relevant to their products. An advertiser promoting hosting services is most likely to sell more when a blogging related blog does the review compared to when it’s done by a dating related blog.
- With credible bloggers - Advertisers should choose bloggers that are authority in a niche or have provided useful criticisms and suggestions to other advertisers. These bloggers are also potential clients and so their opinions about a product are valuable information that allows advertisers to improve their products.
After reading this post, do you think that Google Page Rank is still an important element to consider when using sponsored review as a marketing strategy?
Thank you for your time. 
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Stephan Miller responded on 03 Mar 2008 at 10:05 pm #
I was on the good side of Google this time, going from a 3 to a 4, but I don’t consider it a factor in paid reviews or in paid advertising. The time between updates is too long to factor in and the numbers are so small to begin with. By the time you get to PR5 sites, sites with the same pagerank can have drastically different amounts of incoming links. Alexa is worse. I know two sites that get the same amount of traffic, one with an Alexa of 95,000 and another with 700,000. I think services like Quantcast are the best solution.
Clement Nyirenda responded on 04 Mar 2008 at 3:00 pm #
Dear Rocky
Sad to learn that your Tool Bar PR has been wiped out.But I am sure your Search Engine Ranking Positions have not changed. A number of people whose TBPR had been wiped confirmed that this experience does not affect SERPs and the amount of Google traffic to your blog. These two remain in tact and this leads people to suggest that Google has a REAL but SECRET PR which really defines the quality of your site/blog. The one on the Tool Bar is there just for Google to safeguard their ever growing commercial interests. In other words, to deny their competitors a chance to catch up with them. The funny part is that advertizers have been so brainwashed by the PR issue.They value it greatly. If a lousy site with less traffic and less comment activity can get a PR of 7, all these advertizers will flock to it.Too bad!Which is why I salute IZEA for the Real Ranks initiative. IZEA’s ranking captures a number of parameters in order to determine the rank of a site for advertisement purposes. And I would like to call upon all the advertisers to embrace it.
Clement Nyirenda responded on 04 Mar 2008 at 3:20 pm #
@Stephan Miller:I also do not understand why the time between Google PR updates is too long.A giant like Google should be making PR changes more frequently because the web is so dynamic.
Rocky responded on 04 Mar 2008 at 8:46 pm #
@ Stephan,
Congrats to you new PR.
Most review sites like PPP and SnapBomb still consider PR in factoring the value of a blog. So far, I’m doing well with Alexa. Thanks for dropping by.
@ Clement,
Actually, traffic from Google has been affected. I noticed that the number of external links has been reduced by Google. All the keywords and keyphrases I’ve optimized was placed lower than before. The worse thing is, sponsored review offers has gone down tremendously (which is my major source of income). Monetization is badly affected.
Thanks for dropping by.
Wakish responded on 05 Mar 2008 at 6:50 pm #
I I don’t consider it a factor in paid reviews or in paid advertising..
I think it’s a bias thing to do if people do take it into consideration since PR is specific to google. Have anyone seen rank page by yahoo or msn?
I think this internet world should come up with a more GENERAL Metrics or ranking system to rank pages.
Anyway, on my side I dropped down from a PR4 to a PR3.
But let’s not get frustrated by this.. let’s keep rocking!
Best wishes,
- Wakish -
platinum wedding rings responded on 01 May 2008 at 12:08 am #
PR stopped meaning much many months ago. I am SHOCKED how many people do paid sponsorships on sites that have no original content just ad copy– not the case with yours. So basically the advertisers just aren’t too smart.
platinum wedding rings responded on 01 May 2008 at 12:10 am #
@ Clement
The “update” is only what the public sees. We have no idea when they are actually making changes. Besides PR is such a small factor in ranking. Remember the PR on the toolbar is NOT what a site is right now.