Matt Cutts: PageRank Primary Factor Determining Supplemental Results

I was going to write a long post about this Matt Cutts quote, but I think it speaks for itself.

PageRank is the primary factor determining whether a url is in the main web index vs. the supplemental results.

I predict many seasoned SEOs and newbies alike will dismiss his statement. Firstly, PageRank doesn’t matter, right? Or were you talking about TBPR? But as Matt Cutts made it clear, TBPR is exported internal PageRank translated on a 0-10 scale. The only inaccuracy involved with TBPR is PageRank updates continuously while TBPR updates every few months, and internal PageRank is more granular than TBPR.

But seriously, how can PageRank be the primary factor of anything? Well, here’s a reality check for folks who likes to turn SEO into a fairy tale where you believe what you want to believe in the face of irrefutable facts.

Another quote I found interesting wriiten by Marcia on a recent featured homepage WMW thread about supplemental results and inbound links:

I’m absolutely in agreement with that and it’s stood the test of time - and IBLs & PR. Nope, the toolbar ain’t dead yet; the reports of its demise are grossly exaggerated and contra-indicated by the Supp results and indicators.

Not one single speck of duplication, what’s Supplemental and what isn’t on the test site(s) is 100% dependent on the amount of link love the pages are getting.

People who are looking for dup issues where none exist are, unfortunately, chasing their tails.

g1smd (whom I consider to be well versed on issues revolving around duplicate content and supplemental results) responds:

Heh, Marcia, you’re gonna love this Matt Cutts comment:

>> PageRank is the primary factor determining….

Note: The “primary” factor.

Jeez. No mention of Duplicate Content, and Redirects and 404 URLs at all.

Ah, but maybe he only means for “live” URLs, or maybe redirects and 404s no longer have any PageRank associated with them.

Whatever, it agrees with what you’re saying: and I guess that fuels another link frenzy to start all over again.

Caveman follows up with an interesting comment as well, but I don’t want to turn this page into a duplicate content page by overquoting, ya know what I mean? :D

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2 Responses to “Matt Cutts: PageRank Primary Factor Determining Supplemental Results”

  1. Howdy, I think when Rand et al say PageRank is overrated, its about the PageRank as given in the toolbar. The algorithmic idea behind PageRank - quality links - still matters alot, which is the reason why SEOers are gung-ho on Social Media Marketing and SMO.

    Daniel R said this on March 22nd, 2007 at 6:42 pm

  2. Hey Daniel,

    Nope. Here’s what Rand said to me on SEOmoz:

    “I think it’s bogus - maybe it’s the primary factor in that a huge number of pages that are no longer linked to (in site structures from large sites) drop into supplemental, but for most of the real pages that webmasters want in the index that get dropped, I don’t think PageRank is playing a big role.”

    Let’s get our terminology straight though, because we got “PR”, “PageRank”, “external PageRank”, “internal PageRank”, “Toolbar PR”, and “TBPR.”

    PR = Public Relations, Puerto Rico..
    PageRank = internal PageRank, NOT Toolbar PR. Referring to the Toolbar PR as PageRank is what alot of people do and it adds to the confusion.
    TBPR = Toolbar PageRank, aka external PageRank

    I agree that domain reputation/”authority” may be vastly overrated. See my free seo course article as to why.

    Halfdeck said this on March 23rd, 2007 at 12:02 am

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