Only Google PR 2 for site

When did Google last do a major update?

[Philiboy]

I am doing some SEO work for a site currently with a PR of only 2. The site has no broken links, I've optimised the code so it has no unwieldy code (i.e. with Cascading style sheets), passed it through the CSE HTML validator and removed errors, it has 13 reciprocal links after my link popularity campaign with higher PR sites (mostly 4 and above), it is listed on 11 directories, researched good keywords and worked them in (without over doing it i.e. keeping an eye on keyword density). I've structured the useful links (return links) over several pages. It still only has a Google PR of 2. I know this is a bit of an open question, but should I just be patient now and wait for Google to re-index it? When was the last Google update? It hasn't yet got into DMOZ (how critical is that?). What are the most important additional things to do? Find more link partners? Submit to more directories? Get it listed in MSN (using SITE MATCH) i.e. is it important to get it listed in MSN to help the Google PR improve. I guess the low PR could be due to lots of things but I managed to get the PR to 6 for another site, so I thought I knew all the right techniques. Perhaps I just need to hang on a bit.

[sem4u]

Toolbar PR has not updated for nearly 3 months. Backlinks have updated a couple of times, although are wildly inaccurate.

I would keep collecting links to your site and keep submitting to directories. DMOZ is harder and harder to get into these days. It sounds like you have already submitted. Just sit back and see if you get in (may take months to a year).

[Airportibo]

Unfortunately Microsoft isn't displaying any Sitematch results any more for "quality reasons".

[Vadim]

Toolbar PR has not updated for nearly 3 months.

It is not universlal.

My PR was updated *less than month ago*.

Or more exactly it was restored because I lost it in the new part of my site more than 2 month ago.

Vadim.

[internetheaven]

My PR was updated *less than month ago*.

Please could you explain exactly what you mean as I find it hard to believe that Google updated YOUR PageRank and no-one else's.

[abates]

I had a page drop out of the index, come back with a toolbar PR of 0, and then a few days later its toolbar PR was restored to 4.

However I don't see this as a PR update so much as restoring from backup.

[TheGuyAboveYou]

A friend of mine has a site that was a pr1 two weeks ago before he left on vacation. It was a new site. Between two weeks ago and now it is now showing a pr0 on the toolbar. Not sure why or how but I just checked it and it has changed from pr1 to pr0. He just got back today and showed me his pr change.

[Vadim]

Please could you explain exactly what you mean as I find it hard to believe that Google updated YOUR PageRank and no-one else's.

Please look at my post #22 in the thread.
[webmasterworld.com...]

The details are there. Also if you read through above thread you will notice that some others also reported the update.

Vadim.

[steveb]

[webmasterworld.com...]

Like I mention in the other thread, and your own thread clearly shows, your PR did not update.

[Vadim]

Like I mention in the other thread, and your own thread clearly shows, your PR did not update.

You have not answer on my question in the thread
[webmasterworld.com...]
(message #61). So I repeat it in short form here.

If the PR in the Google toolbar changes and you tell that it is not an update what do you call update?

Vadim.

[steveb]

Hmmm, I'm not subway...

"If the PR in the Google toolbar changes and you tell that it is not an update what do you call update?"

An update is when PR changes across the board on at least one Google datacenter. PR is relative. When one thing changes, everything changes. It is impossible to simply update one thing.

The toolbar display can change for lots of reasons. First, the way PR has been displaying for query string URLs has changed at least three times in the past few months. It meant nothing. Second, it is common for PR to go to zero when pages fall out of the database (and then they regain PR when they come back), or when they are pegged as duplicates. As you stated yourself, this obviously happened with your domain, so the PR changing its display from 4 to 0 to 4 means nothing.

[Vadim]

steveb,
First, thanks for the explanation.

When one thing changes, everything changes.

I believe, that it is not necessary so. It depends on algorithm and the algorithm change may be the reason why we do not (and may be never in future) see the major update.

The point is that Google in any case does not have instant snapshot of the link structure. While it browses one group of sites other may change their links.

Because of this there are actually no benefits to update PR once in a month for all sites altogether. It will cause “dance” and abrupt fluctuations.

Google may just begin to update PR continuously on site by site basis. In this case, since an individual site has in general very small influence to other sites PR, most of the time PR will be constant and abruptly changes only when it is calculated for this particular page.

PR has been displaying for query string URLs has changed at least three times in the past few months. It meant nothing

May be you are right, but I feel that I know exactly why my PR changed and my case not so obvious.

First my site never was out of index as a whole. The new part might be out but not more that for a day or 2. The old part (same IP) was never out and never lost PR.

Second, after the redesign one page got PR after 2 weeks probably because it had no inbound links but good outbound links. Other new part got higher PR (about 4) but month after. So there were no sporadic fluctuations in my case.

Vadim.

[Philiboy]

Since I initiated this discussion, Googlebot has visited the site in question 17 times over a period of 2 to 3 days (the web analytics reports shows 17 host entries similar to "crawl-66-249-64-16.googlebot.com"). A day or so has elapsed since these visits, with no change yet in Google PR for the site. If the site deserves a PR improvement (and I have done substantial work to improve it's link reputation amongst other SEO work), does anyone know how long I might now need to wait? A PR of 2 also still shows up on seo chat's Future PageRank tool across all the Google servers. At what point can I assume that the Google reindexer has decided not to update the PR if I continue to observe no change? Help here will be greatly appreciated - and thanks for your comments thus far.

[subway]

"If the PR in the Google toolbar changes and you tell that it is not an update what do you call update?"

urm? I never said that. I'm firmly in the PR has NOT updated for over 3 months camp.

[Vadim]

At what point can I assume that the Google reindexer has decided not to update the PR if I continue to observe no change

It of course depends, but for most of my site I waited 2 months. One page has PR update in 2 weeks but it was the special case with no inbound links and hence no need to the sanbox effect.

Vadim