Your Alexa Rating Is It Really That Important?

Your Alexa Rating Is It Really That Important?

by: Richard Grady

A discussion in my forum has prompted this newsletter as I think it is important for any online entrepreneur to understand how Alexa ratings work in order that they can understand why they may not be that important to the success of their online business. Too many people make the mistake of concentrating entirely on improving their Alexa ratings but at the end of the day, these rankings are just numbers they won’t put money in the bank.

Alexa is a company owned by the Amazon group and it aims to rank every single website on the Internet in terms of how much traffic it is receiving.

Quite simply, the lower your Alexa ranking, the more traffic your website gets. The ideal scenario would be to have an Alexa ranking of ก1ก. This would mean, in theory, that your website receives more traffic than any other website in the world. Currently this position is held by Yahoo.com and as you would expect, other top sites include Microsoft, Google and eBay.

It is generally considered that a website with an Alexa rating of 100,000 or less is receiving a reasonable level of traffic but Alexa can be wildly misleading and very easily manipulated.

To understand why the rankings are misleading, you need to understand how Alexa gathers the data that it uses to create the rankings in the first place. This is really very simple Alexa has a free toolbar that you can download and install within your Internet browser and this reports back to Alexa with the details of every single website that you visit.

Alexa can then use this information to see how many users are visiting a particular website. Then, because not every Internet user has the Alexa toolbar installed, Alexa will multiply the number of visitors by a specific margin to estimate the total number of visitors that a site may typically receive. The important word in the last sentence is กestimateก.

Letกs assume that the above multiplication margin is ten that means that for each Alexa toolbar user that visits a specific web page, Alexa assumes that another nine nontoolbar users will also visit the same page. This means that if 100 toolbar users visit a specific web page on a given day, Alexa will take this as meaning that a total of 1000 people visited the same page in that 24 hour period.

This is where the figures can get distorted. If you have a website that attracts a higher than average number of Alexa toolbar users, then you are going to gain a lower Alexa rating because Alexa doesn’t make any allowance for the fact that their toolbar users visit certain types of site more often. A typical example of this is Internet marketing sites. Most Internet entrepreneurs will have the Alexa toolbar installed because they like to see the Alexa rankings for sites as they visit them (the toolbar shows you this information as soon as you visit a site). But this means that if your website attracts a lot of Internet marketingtype visitors, then your Alexa rating will be inflated above what it should be.

Here is a truelife example:

There was a popular Internet marketing site for sale last year and it had an Alexa rating of about 19,000. I figured it must be getting heavy traffic but when I discussed the matter with the owner/seller, I found that it was only receiving 6000 unique visitors a month! The reason that the Alexa rating was so low was because the majority of these visitors had the Alexa toolbar installed and therefore the calculations were being thrown out massively.

It is also possible to purchase software that will generate false hits to your site using the Alexa technology so that Alexa is fooled into believing that more people are visiting your site. This pushes your Alexa ranking down.

At the end of the day though, what is the point of having a low Alexa rating if you are not making any sales? Sure it is nice to be able to say that your site is in the top 20,000 websites in the world but if the site isn’t earning you an income, this ranking means very little (assuming that it was your intention for the site to earn you an income of course). Personally, I would much rather have a high Alexa ranking but a good income than a low ranking and minimal income.

Of course, there are benefits to the Alexa service and it can be worthwhile installing their toolbar. The toolbar will give you an indication of how busy a particular site is and in turn, how popular it is. This can be helpful when making a decision as to whether to make an online purchase for example. It is also handy for checking out your competitors 🙂

Just don’t get too hung up on Alexa as a measure of how well your business is doing. The real statistics that you should be watching are actual traffic numbers, conversion rates (ie. how many visitors actually buy something) and overall sales. These are the figures that will help you put cash in the bank and improve and grow your business.

If you are interested in finding out more about Alexa and if you wish to install their toolbar, you can do so at http://www.alexa.com

Copyright 2004 Richard Grady

About The Author

Richard Grady has been helping people earn online since 1998. Find out more about Richard at: http://www.thetraderonline.com. Free wholesale search engines: UK http://www.wholesale118.co.uk and US http://www.thewholesaletrader.com.

This article was posted on September 16, 2004

by Richard Grady

Six Reasons Why Your Alexa Rating Is Still Importa

Six Reasons Why Your Alexa Rating Is Still Important

by: Tinu AbayomiPaul

1. Additional Exposure For Your Site.

At the end of 2003, Alexa.comกs results were being closely linked into the listings of itsก parent company, Amazon.com. This currently means that when someone reviews your site, it is linked to their amazon profile, which can be accessed when people browsing for books look to see what reviewers like them suggest. In the future, it could mean that amazon.com will integrate your web site in other ways, such as showing a list of websites related to popular topics such as marketing.

2. Alexaกs relationship with Google.com

See if you can name one major partnership that Google.com or Amazon.com has had where the other party came out worse off in the end.

Yahoo? I don’t think so. Though their relationship has soured for reasons that aren’t common knowledge, and Google.com does not supply Yahoo with search results any longer, it certainly didn’t make Yahoo.com less popular a destination online. If anything, more webmaster like you and me, who could not afford the $200 fee for a commercial review to be listed, rush to Yahoo to see if our Google listings really were coming up number one there, too. Can’t think of any other one, can you?

Letกs discuss how this is relevant to you.

This little known advantage to having a good Alexa rating is fairly new. I was doing some research on Google, at the end of last year, to see what was the fastest, cheapest way to get my brand new site good ranking and fast inclusion in Googleกs database. Using Alexa.com, I was able to discover one of the biggest secrets online that showed me how to get a visit from the Googlebot spider and included in their index in under a week. The Googlebot spider now visits the home page of my site every day, re=spidering my site when I make significant changes.

While I was at Alexa, I noticed that very quietly, without a lot of hoopla or publicity, Alexa Internet began to include a Google search right in their toolbar at the end of last year. Upon further investigation, I realized that Alexa and Google were getting quite chummy. This relationship directly led to the idea I had which uncovered a way to get Alexa and Google to help me get free, unlimited traffic for any keyword related to my siteกs topic.

The idea was so simple, so cheap, and so profitable that I started to write a book about it, which I finished this past January. Everything was great, I was getting great traffic. Then I woke up one morning and checked my email, and most of my online colleagues were ticked off about something called the Florida update, which caused many small commercial websites to have their listings drop in ranking or disappear altogether.

Of course, I went to check on my site.

Not only did my ranking not drop, I had additional listings and improved exposure. One of the several factors that appeared to be the reason for my improved rankings, not just in spite of, but because of the Florida update, was my Alexa ranking. Further testing on other commercial sites of fellow small business owners confirmed this.

This experience taught me to pay a lot more attention to my Alexa rating, as well as to have a new appreciation for the ratings of all my sites.

Your Alexa rating is still relevant to you because it appears to be a factor in your page rank at Google. Generally, anything that is important to Google is important to me, because I wanted to learn how to make the site an excellent source of traffic for me. And it worked.

Working to have a rise in my Alexa rating helped me in my quest for free quality traffic as well every increase in my Alexa rating has coincided with a rise in both the number of keywords I rank for and the likelihood that my site will appear on the first page of search results, first at Google, then with other search engines.

Youกd never know that I haven’t ever submitted them my link.

3.Your competitorกs awareness is increasing.

Those of us who have been online since the early 90กs, before the graphical interface we now call the World Wide Web, are well aware of the Alexa toolbar, and there are many schools of thought as to its effectiveness as an indicator of your siteกs traffic.

Whether you believe itกs effective or useful, the fact remains that you can use the Alexa toolbar and the resources at Alexa.com to give your site a competitive advantage. Your competition knows this if they have any marketing savvy at all.

While not as compelling as the fact that Google is now tied to Alexa, itกs no small issue that other webmasters are beginning to show interest in Alexa.com again. Now that Alexa is being positioned to have a closer integration with Amazon, has improved their toolbar to include a free popup blocker and Google search results, as well as given webmasters incentive to install the Alexa toolbar, many site owners either offer the toolbar or display their Alexa ranking proudly on their sites.

So, no matter what your personal feelings about the Alexa toolbar are, it may be a good idea to gain the advantages it offers, before your rivals do.

4. Client awareness is rising

Even if you’re not a commercial website, and don’t really compete with other sites for anything other than traffic, you still have to deal with the fact that your visitors are becoming more aware of the Alexa toolbar again. Alexa allows you to customize a version of their toolbar and allow you to offer it as a free download from your site. Not only can you profit from their amazon.com purchases, but when regular visitors return to your site with the toolbar installed, it can help maintain your ranking.

The way things are going, the situation of having clients checking your Alexa reviews and ratings before they buy from you to one day be routine. Do you want to be ahead of that possible trend, or wait, and push it when everyone else finally catches on?

5. Alexaกs Perceived Importance

The whole reason for this article is that in answer to the last article I wrote about Alexa, I got a lot of feedback questioning whether Alexa Internet and its toolbar were still important to webmasters. So far, at minimum, for the last two reasons I stated, the Perception of Alexa being an important webmaster tool is increasing.

So even if you don’t think it is important, if your visitors feel it is, then it may be time for you to at least pay attention to the recent changes.

6. Alexaกs Actual Importance

As Alexaกs perceived importance is growing, itกs actual importance seems to be moving at the same rate. Hereกs why.

It would be one thing if all the hoopla about Alexa took place and everyone installed or reinstalled the toolbar, and everyone found out that both the site and the toolbar were useless. Remember when autosurf exchanges first became popular? Everyone jumped on the bandwagon for about a month, then several articles came out about six weeks later, stating that they were ineffectual because real humans weren’t viewing the sites anymore.

Look around the Net for about an hour and see if you can find any new negative press about Alexa from webmasters since November. All Iกve seen are the same questions there were before is my Alexa rating important, and why? Are Alexaกs traffic stats accurate?

And I still have the same answers. Your Alexa rating is important to you if you have a commercial website because it is important to Google and to your competition. And whether your site is commercial or not, it is becoming important to your visitors, which is why your site exists to cater to them, you should make your siteกs relationship with Alexa.com a priority.

As to Alexaกs statistical accuracy, I can’t say for sure. Itกs a much debated topic. But itกs pretty much indisputable that getting into the top 100,000 sites is a significant achievement, though perhaps not as difficult as some think. And having a top 50,000 site is not something that can really be cheated or faked. So perhaps it is not perfectly exact as a comparison of your site to another unrelated site.

But it is the closest thing to a universal, impartial 3rd party measure of traffic we have. And more importantly, it can give your clients yet another reason to trust you enough to buy from your site. Testimonials in the form of reviews on their site, as well as fast access to your contact information from outside your site can mean the difference between a browser and a buyer.

If you haven’t had the chance to download the Alexa toolbar, you can get it from http://www.freetrafficdirectory.com/alexatoolbar or you can get the Alexa Snapshot from www.alexa.com if you have Netscape or if you’re not on a PC. Itกs a free resource, and all you have to lose or gain is more free traffic.

About The Author

Tinu is a free traffic FANATIC. She has been offered treatment for this condition but says it just saves her too much money! For more free traffic secrets, subscribe to the Free Traffic Secrets Ezine by sending any blank email to [email protected] bonuses for subscribers include free access to a resource that gets you free advertising for life in 9 minutes a day. Or, get Tinuกs free Google optimization guide at http://www.freetrafficdirectory.com

This article was posted on February 26, 2004

by Tinu AbayomiPaul