Love it or hate it Page Rank (PR) is if anything, one of the biggest moot points in SEO there is, certainly within the directory industry. If you look at the vast majority of forums even remotely touching on seo and or the directory industry, you’ll see what I mean. So, with this in mind I’m taking on the challenge of looking a little deeper into this modern day phenomenon and the psychological impact, if any, its had on us.

This isn’t going to be a ’scientific’ look at Page Rank by any stretch of the imagination, nor am I going to look at the ‘why’, ‘what’, ‘where’, and ‘how’, Google uses algorithmic manipulation to reach a conclusion of what constitutes a good PR and what doesn’t. I’ll leave that kind of thing to the hundreds of SEO experts and Mathematical Genius’ to work out. My goal is to look at the psychological impact, if any, PR has had on the internet, primarily the directory industry.

What is all this Google PageRank hullabaloo all about? Why has what is nothing more than a little green bar had such a profound impact on arguably every directory owner on the planet? What is it so magnetic about the little green bar with the numbers 0-10 on it?

I’m not going to assume that everyone knows what PR is, but rather than write about it, with the risk of probably duplicating someone else’s already written text I’m just going to reference one link here so that those that don’t know can learn, and those that do, can, well, learn some more or don’t click on the link.

Carrying on…

Anyone involved in the directory or search field would be either a bit of a fibber or in serious need of thought re-adjustment if they couldn’t admit they’ve at least to ’some’ degree felt the reverberations of the ups and downs that accompany each passing PR ‘update’. Forums buzz with anticipation, bloggers start blogging, and sub cultures get created. By ’sub-cultures’ I mean the small private cliques of directory owners who spend hours on the instant messengers and the forum p.m’s formulating ‘plans’ on how to deal with the impending update. Don’t take my word for it, wait until the next update, take a look and you’ll see.

It starts off as Chinese whispers, slowly but surely growing into a raging torrent of PR fever. People desperate to know ‘what’s happening’, wanting to keep ‘up to the second’ with latest events start to question every little thing, every datacentre wobble; you name it, people question it. I picked some of the most common types of questions and posts on PR that I’ve read over the last year. As much as I’d like to, I won’t say who wrote them, but hey, you never know, you might be one of them reading this blog! How weird would that be!

The more serious of the PR watchers have already learned how to ‘recognise’ when an update is imminent through a number of ways other than the whispers and veiled hints from the Matt Cutt’s of the World. Websites that have those addictive little Page Rank prediction tools is one way. Just you check, and you’ll see their traffic spike through the roof! Another thing you might notice is that submissions to directories invariably increase, new SEO companies are formed, and yet more ’self proclaimed experts’ spring up, eager to offer their slant on what’s happening, and why. As the inevitable update happens you can almost set your clock by the next set of events.

It all starts off with the inevitable crow of success and puffing of chests; the feel good factor on ‘how successful you’ve been, this time’, (see below) you might recognise some…

• Hey, my directory went to a PR4 from a PR0, cool or what!
• All my Inner pages are PR0 but I got PR5 for my home page!
• All my pages are PR4, been doing it right!
• Haha, My Directory is only 2 months old and PR2 like!

to the more serious ‘players’, (and believe it or not, they do exist)

• ‘PR6 and only spent XXX amount of $000’s for back-links this time..’ (slightly exaggerated you think?, sadly it isn’t!).
• PR4’s through the board, investment was worth it.

Little did these ’successful one’s realize that this feeling of elation was to be short lived, none of us saw what was coming, but that’s another story for another time.

the ‘aftermath’…

• That’s funny, my toolbar isn’t showing any changes?
• Not all data-centers have updated yet must be the reason?
• OMG! I’ve lost my PR4 now I only have a PR1, Why?
  
• Your lucky, I got a greyed out bar!

Now tell me I’m making this up, because if I am I need to reformat my Computer and speak to the owners of DP, Sitepoint and the like, because I’m seeing imaginary threads if I’m wrong!

How elated have you felt if you were one of the ‘lucky ones’ to have an increase in your PR? Do you feel justified for all the hard work you’ve put in? Did you sigh with relief that all the money you ‘invested’ in buying links in just about anything you could paid off, and that now you’ve finally got a PR you can talk about, you can use your new found PR status as a ’selling point’ to recoup the investment. Or were you one of those who felt sick to the stomach when you saw the greyed out bar on your browser, which was then re-enforced by the obligatory visit to the now abundant PR datacentre checkers?

Be honest with yourself here, were you one of those who immediately called his friends, colleagues, and even family to boast of the achievement, or to question why you never got that much anticipated increase? I know I was.

That little green bar affected each and every one of us, and even when I post this blog, and the inevitable ‘victim’ of PR decrease says either to himself or to his peers, ‘it never bothered me one bit’, they know it did, I’m certain of it.

Did any of you notice the sudden ‘reversal of views’ people had on PR? Those who lost it all of a sudden turned against what only the day before they were praising as ‘one of the most important factors’ of a directory! ‘The higher the PR the better your directory’ was the message constantly sold to us. But now, you could almost ‘feel’ the bitterness of the posters who ‘turned against’ PR putting it down as ‘nothing more than a gimmick’. Strange isn’t it how fickle we are that we can change quicker than the weather if it suits us.

I’ve only skimmed the surface of how serious an issue PR is, I’ve deliberately not gone into depth on just how powerful an impact the little green bar has on us. Look at the last set of bullet points I wrote (above). This is what I called the ‘PR post mortem’, period. As alive the forums were prior to the anticipated update, they are now equally alive, this time with completely different undertones. Questions were made, allegations thrown, blame apportioned, and opinions divided.

• It’s the fault of those people buying links why we’ve all been punished..
• Google don’t want us to sell links because they want it all themselves…
• I blame it on the quick buck crew, they spoilt it for us…

Again, the list would be endless, but you get the point,…

I haven’t been selective with these examples by the way, they were simply the first that came into mind as some of the predominant ‘post mortem’ questions, where everyone desperately sought ‘answers’, and tried to ‘apportion blame’. Truth be known, If I mentioned them all I’d end up writing war and peace part 2! It would be the same with each set of bullet points above. If I’ve missed any favourites let me know, I can always edit the post.

So where have we got to? Well let me ask you the question again. Has any of the blog above pricked your memory? Do you recognise even a small portion of what I’ve written? Do any of the bullet points ring a bell? The answer in truth should be without question YES. Anyone and everyone who’s started a directory, worked on a directory, submitted to a directory, or even just though about opening a directory would have at some point come across at least one of the points mentioned above. If not, then they’ve not been to the forums or done their homework.

So what have we learned here? Well, the one thing we’ve learned is that whether we can admit it or not the psychological power of the little green bar is phenomenal. And to demonstrate this I’m just going to post the most obvious of ‘Traits’ and ‘Emotions’ the little green bar exposed, or created with its presence.

In no particular order…

• Greed
• Jealousy
• Anxiety
• Denial
• Ambition
• Fear
• Paranoia

Again, I could go on but I think the 7 listed just about covers the major emotions and behaviour patterns if you think about it. Do any of the emotions listed above belong to you? I know at least two that belong to me though I’m not telling which ones. I can say that it wasn’t number one though.

So to sum it up, can you see how that little green bar, as much as we’d like to dismiss it as ‘nothing more than a gimmick’, really has a massive power. There probably isn’t one person who’s reading this blog that hasn’t experienced at least one of the 7 emotions I talk of. Whether it was because our livelihood depended on it, or whether it was just our ego that needed to be satiated, the little green bar did just that, even if it was only for a brief while.

Do you think the little green bar is likely to continue to have this scarily powerful psychological impact on our lives? Do you think we’ll need the little green bar now that we know what it can do? You bet your bottom dollar it will, and we do. And when the next update is upon us every single one of us will reach for the bookmark to the nearest PR checkers as sure as your reading this text!

Coming soon… Can PR really work?