Google Anomaly

http:// vs. http://www

[ControlZ]

Here is a strange one the may provide insight into how Google ranks pages.

I own a domain name (it's 4 yrs old), and I know Google gives weight to domains that have been around a while.

The site under this domain has never been registered with ANY search engines or directories.
Domain has only been online for a few weeks
Site contains almost no content

I just recently decided to use this domain as a resource for my web design clients. This domain is being used to provide VERY BASIC support for existing clients.

If I access the site using http://www.example.com I see a page rank of 0, but if I enter http://example.com I see a page rank of 4.

To top it off, the site had a nofollow.txt file and had no other meta tags except a title.

The only links to this site were in the comments section of several JavaScript files I wrote and used on several sites. <!--This script available on www.anydomain.com-->

I was always lead to believe comments did not help achieve a higher ranking.

What the difference in page rank between http:// and [www?...]

I recently added a full set of meta tags to see if I can get this site a top 10 ranking on Google, even though it has almost no content.

Interested in hearing any comments.

[edited by: msgraph at 1:34 pm (utc) on Oct. 10, 2005]
[edit reason] example.com'd urls [/edit]

[tedster]

Are you saying that the comment tag alone seems to be responsible for a PR4? Hard to believe -- I'd look around for other links on the web.

But yes, www and non-www versions of a domain may well be ranked differently. They are different urls and are not necessarily the same content.

[ControlZ]

Been doing some thinking and here's what I think may have happened. The domain was parked under another domain -- I think it may have picked up the page rank from the parent domain, but it has been a seperate domain for several weeks now. There were never any links to this domain other then the comments on various sites.

[qbeek]

@ControlZ

Sorry, just to complete the scenario:

Do you remember, totally, how many times you spoke about the domain in the other domains (5, 10, 20 , 100 )?
And how many domains are involved?

Did you speak about it using <!--This script available on www.anydomain.com--> or did you also use <!--This script available on anydomain.com-->?
Which format did you use mainly?

thanks in advance ... if you decide to share this info.

(I hope my english is good enough)
Qbeek

[Wizard]

And if parked domain redirected to other, high PR domain, it acquires its PR in toolbar PR, but not in read PR.

[rainborick]

Google has been seen to scan JavaScript for complete URLs and has done so for a year or more now. I suspect they wanted to accomodate all of the sites that rely on various JavaScript-based menu systems. So its not all that surprising to discover that they apparently don't even attempt to parse the code, but rather just scan for http:// followed by a valid URL.

Google treats the www. prefix as a separate subdomain of the parent or root domain until they go through a periodic canonicalization process. Until then, not only will the two versions of the URL get separate PageRank, they are indexed separately too, which can lead to some pages being suppressed/penalized for duplicated content. Its always a good idea to pick one version of your URL as the "good" version - and set up 301 redirects so that whenever a request for the "bad" version of the site's URL is received, it gets redirected to the "good" version in a fashion that the search engines will eventually recognize.

[ControlZ]

Wizard, what is the difference between read PR and toolbar PR? Do you think this is beneficial -- improving the toolbar PR?

[ControlZ]

Qbeek, it was referred to as <--!this script available on www.thisdomain.com--> in the comments section of JavaScript. It was probably mentioned over the course of several yrs, on approx 20+ sites, on every page the script appeared.

[g1smd]

Toolbar PR lags the "real PR" by several months.

Once you get the site up and running, get a 301 redirect installed from non-www to www or vice versa to eliminate showing duplicate content.

[g1smd]

<--! this script available on www.thisdomain.com-->

If indeed you had the tag begin with <--! then that is not the right code for beginning a comment, and the text would have been spidered as if it were real content.

[ControlZ]

rainborick, I recently set a 301.

What's strange is the reference to this domain (in JavaScript comments) was always referred to as [www...] and not http://

The http:// has a PR of 4 while the www has a 0 PR.

[ControlZ]

typo - comment was written as <!--This script available on www.anydomain.com--> and not as previously mentioned

[Digerati]

Toolbar PR lags the "real PR" by several months.

What is the real PR and how would I decipher it?

[g1smd]

You could never find the real PR unless you worked inside the 'plex.

[ControlZ]

So how do you know there is such a thing as a "real" PR? What sense would it make to have a two tier PR system?

[g1smd]

Keeps the PR spammers at a distance.

Google also only shows a few of the links that it actually knows about when you use the link:yourdomain.com command (they used to show all links of PR 4 and above).