Information about Google Algorithm Update Analysis

Many sites are rocketing into the top 10 which, of course, means that many sites are being dropped at the same time. We have noticed some fairly dramatic shifts in the algorithm starting weekend. After a weekend of analysis there are some curiosities in the results that simply require further tweaks in the ranking system.

This update seems to have revolved around three main areas:
>> Domain age
>> Backlinks
>> Page Rank

Domain Age

It appears that Google is presently giving a lot of weight to the age of a domain and, in this SEO's opinion. While the age of a domain can definitely be used as a factor in determining how solid a company or site is, there are many newer sites that provide some great information and innovative ideas.

On this basis I want to say that Google's use of domain age as a whole is a good filter, allowing them to “sandbox” sites on day one to insure that they aren't just being launched to rank quickly for terms. So I approve of domain age being used to value a site – to a point.This appears to have changed in the recent update with age holding a disproportionate weight. In a number of instances this has resulted in older, less qualified domains to rank higher than newer sites of higher quality.

Back links

The way that back links are being calculated and valued has seen some adjustments in the latest update as well. The way backlinks are being valued appears to have lost some grasp on relevancy and placed more importance on sheer numbers. Sites with large, unfocused reciprocal link directories are outranking sites with fewer but more relevant link. Non-reciprocal links lost the “advantages” that they held over reciprocal links until recently.

PageRank

On the positive side of the equation, PageRank appears to have lost some of it's importance including the importance of PageRank as it pertains to the value of a backlinks. In my opinion this is a very positive step on Google's part and shows a solid understanding of the fact that PageRank means little in terms of a site's importance.

Conclusion

So what does all of this mean? First, it means that this Thursday or Friday we can expect yet another update to correct some of the issues we've seen rise out of the most current round. This shouldn't surprise anyone too much, we've been seeing regular updates out of Google quite a bit over the past few months.

Lower PageRank, high relevancy links will once again surpass high quantity, less relevant links. Google is getting extremely good and determining relevancy and so I assume the current algorithm issues has more to do with the weight assigned to different factors than an inability to properly calculate a links relevancy.

And in regards to PageRank, Google will likely shift back slightly to what worked and give more importance to PageRank, at least while they figure out what went awry here.