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Page Rank Sculpting is a relatively new term for technique intended to dictate and transfer Google Page Rank to other pages on a website, with a focus on managing internal linking.
Why use Page Rank Sculpting?What you need to know is that all pages carry a Page Rank and also distribute it. For example, in a very simplistic form, if a page has a Page Rank of 9 and links to 3 other pages, it passes 3 'points' to each page. However, what if one page is important and one isn't, like a Privacy Policy? You couldn't care less if your Privacy Policy ranks well, but your Services page is a whole different matter. This is where Page Rank Sculpting comes into play... The NoFollow attributeThe NoFollow attribute is widely used in Page Rank Sculpting. By placing this attribute in a link, you are telling Google (and other search engines that listen to it) that you do not endorse that link. Therefore, Google does not pass Page Rank on to that link. By using the NoFollow attribute, you can stop Page Rank being shared with unimportant pages and therefore give more weight to the pages that matter. So, should I use NoFollow?In June 2009, Google Software Engineer Matt Cutts commented on his blog that
He has been even more explicit since, saying;
So those are the words from the horses mouth. Instead of thinking about what links should be NoFollow, perhaps the best way to analyse your web pages is by asking yourself "Are all these links on this page contextual and relevant to the user?" If you can then remove some links, the ones that matter will get more Page Rank points. Of course, just because someone from Google tells you to do something else in the name of relevancy, it doesn't mean it won't necessarily work in the short term at least. SEO resource website SEOMoz claims using NoFollow attributes has given an almost 20% increase in traffic. We're in the midst of our own tests, so we'll update this article shortly! What about blogs?Soon after hen NoFollow was introduced in 205, Google's own blo mentioned using NoFollow to prevent comment spam. If you have a blog and use popular software for it, you'll probably already be aware that the comments section automatically puts in NoFollow for all links posted. The idea is, because many people spam blogs, it would result in a lot of Page Rank 'leak.' The key is not to be obsessed with how many websites you link to. Matt Cutts goes on to say that " In the same way that Google trusts sites less when they link to spammy sites or bad neighbourhoods, parts of our system encourage links to good sites." So should I link to popular sites?Think relevancy. Linking to a website on the BBC (for example) that has more information on what your article is discussing is great because its both relevant and a trusted site. If you were to just link to the BBC homepage, it won't help you.
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