PageRank is an algorithm used by the Google Search engine to determine the importance of a website and certain pages on that website. It works by counting the number and quality of links to a page to determine a rough estimate of how important the website is. Ranks pages from a PR 3 to 7 is a good PageRank. PRs 8 to 10 generally are found with large companies. Generally your internal pages will have a lower PageRank. PageRank is the best known method for how Google ranks sites, but it is not the only method they use. PageRank is one of 200 methods used to determine search engine rankings. PageRank is based on the assumption that more important websites are likely to receive more links from other websites. This makes link building important from quality websites.

Google also looks at how likely people are to land on your site when clicking on links randomly. This means the more important your links are the better you will rank. Your search engine rank (SERP) is more important. You can have a lower PageRank, and outrank some sites. Proof Google uses much more than PageRank to determine quality. Manipulating PageRank is much more difficult now. Buying high PageRank links is something to be careful of. "nofollow" Link attribute was added to combat manipulation. rel='nofollow’ HTML tag is added to links to combat passing of PageRank. You find this on forums or with blog comments.

SEO updates are when search engines (most noticeably Google) makes a change to their algorithm. Google is always changing how they rank websites. Major changes are the ones you hear about or read about. Panda, Penguin, or Hummingbird Websites you can follow to stay up to date on latest search engine updates. SearchEngineWatch.com SearchEngineLand.com SEOBook.com/blog Moz.com/blog (Formerly SEOMoz)

SEO updates have been known to cripple businesses. Be careful about staying in compliance with search engines. Always stay concerned about your user’s experience. Stay focused on producing the best content possible. Use the methods being taught in this course. Avoid “Black Hat” SEO gimmicks. Focus on gaining exposure. Blogging Video Podcast Articles (Guest Posts, Industry Article Sites, Forums) Social media marketing Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest Banner ads Paid traffic through Facebook ads, Google Adwords, or Bing Ads