How Link Popularity Weight in Search Engine Ranking

Many people believe that link popularity plays a very important role in Search Engine ranking. In other words, the more backlinks your website is, the higer ranking in Search Engines will be expected.

But how important that link popularity is? I am afraid that nobody can answer this question. However we try to analyse the weight that link popularity plays in Search Engines ranking.

This can be done by searching a keyword, then compare the link popularity with the websites ranked on the top ten.

We ran a search with the keyword "web marketing" in a Search Engine in year 2005 and got the websites ranked on top ten.

We then checked the link popularity, PageRank, any keyword found in their domain names, any keyword found in their title tag and any keyword found in their description tag. Here's the result:

Rank	Link Popularity	Page Rank	Keyword Found in Domain Name	Keyword Found in Title	Keyword Found in Description
1	1410	6	web	web marketing + Marketing	web marketing
2	220	8	web	No	web marketing + Marketing
3	135	5	-	web marketing	web marketing + web Marketing
4	5110	7	-	No	marketing
5	111	5	Marketing	web marketing + Marketing	web marketing + Marketing + Marketing
6	356	6	web	marketing	marketing + web
7	127	5	webmarketing	web marketing	web marketing
8	315	5	-	web marketing	web marketing
9	373	6	-	web marketing	web marketing
10	463	6	-	marketing, web	web marketing

Take some times to look at the ranked top ten websites......

Here's what we found:

• The ranked 4 website had the highest backlinks (5110 backlinks)
• The highest backlinks website do not ranked number one.
• The ranked number one website had only 1410 backlines
• Some websites had only about 100 backlinks even ranked in top ten
• The highest backlinks website (5110 backlinks) also ranked high despite the domain name and Title did not have keywords. In other words, high link popularity did help in high ranking.
• The keywords found in the Domain Name, Title and Description actually played an important part in ranking high in Search Engines

Conclusion of Link Popularity Vs Search Engine Ranking

It seems that link popularity only play a portion in Search Engine ranking. Your web webpages can be ranked on top so far they have more than 100 backlinks. Therefore you don't need to strive for as much backlinks as possible. A reasonable amount of backlinks is good enough to rank high in Search Engines.

Once you got about 100 backlinks, the other factors to rank high are in the domain name, Title and Description. Study the above example again, you should get more idea how to rank high.

Look at the websites that ranked #3, #5, #7 and #8, they only have a small backlinks but still can rank high in Search Engines because of proper keywords in their Domain Name, Title and Description. The websites are listed below for your study. The first lines are the Title while the others are the Description.

Ranked No. 3
Web Marketing e Posizionamento: suggerimenti utili e guide Gratis!
Web Marketing: GRATIS Guide elettroniche, novità, dritte, consigli utili di Web Marketing e Posizionamento nei Motori di Ricerca - Newsletter con le ultime novita' GRATIS per te!

Ranked No.5
Web Marketing - Corsi gratis di Marketing on-line
Corso on-line di web marketing gratis: guide, consigli ebook e suggerimenti utili di posizionamento sui motori di ricerca, email marketing, pubblicita' online, e marketing on-line. Corsi, guide elettroniche, articoli e approfondimenti ...

Ranked No. 7
Web Marketing Now | Certified Search Engine Consultants | SEO ...
Web Marketing Now, certified SEO consultant & search engine specialists.

Ranked No. 8
Web Marketing - Segreti di Posizionamento nei Motori, E-mail ...
Presenta un offerta basata su corsi di formazione professionale e servizi di web marketing.

The best way to study and analyse how Search Engines raking pages are do some search on some keywords. Then check the top 30 websites why they can be ranked so high.

This page discuss how link popularity play an role in Search Engines ranking.