Why Alexa Rankings May or May Not Be Important, But Why You Should Pay Attention Anyway

SEO.

Page Rank.

Alexa Ranking.

Metrics.

You may have heard these terms from time to time, if you manage your own blog or website.  Many companies make a living telling you how to improve your Search Engine Optimization, your Alexa Ranking, and your pagerank in google searches.

If you do some research, some sites will tell you it's a waste of time.  Others will tell you your website's livelihood depends on your 'ranking.'

I can tell you this:  I run adspace on my site, and belong to a handful of 'review' and 'business' sites looking to post things on my site.  2 out of 3 interviews, I am asked "What is your Alexa Ranking?"

66.7% is enough of a percentage to get my attention...

Alexa is a metrics site that measures a website's popularity.  The lower your number, the better you are.

The #1 ranked website, according to Alexa?

Google, of course...

The more people that visit your site, the higher your Alexa ranking.  The more that link back to you, the higher your ranking.

In other words, a low score means high popularity.

On that note, where do I stand?

It changes daily, but here is a review of my site from Alexa, as of April 30th 2012:

Click to enlarge

Comparatively, Hyperbole and a Half is ranked in the 47,000's and has over 7,600 sites linking in.  I'm still fairly low on the totem pole, but I'm still withing the top 500,000 websites out there.

(I will let you know their numbers are a little off though.  It says I have 632 daily visitors and 788 daily pageviews, while the counters on my blogger dashboard are about 4-5 times higher, depending on the day...)

Alexa will also let you know a snapshot of your readership.  Demographics are king, especially to potential business partners...

Heavy female audience, aged 25-45.  How YOU doin???

And while Alexa has its flaws, it's still good ammunition to have on your side.  If you use your website as a business tool, people will ask where you rank.

So how can you improve your Alexa ranking?  Thanks to Stephanie at Crazy Beautiful Life, there are two main things you can do:

- Download the Alexa Toolbar and install on your browser.  This will add you to the demographic pool so they can measure your data.  This, in turn, will raise your ranking like it did mine.  Slowly, but any bit helps, right?

- Network network network.  Find other people that have signed up for Alexa accounts, and get them to write reviews about your site.  Be willing to write some reviews in return.  Mutual back-scratching will help the savvy surpass the slow.

These two tips have helped me manage my ranking, and will help you too.  If you run ads on your site, this will give you bragging rights (it's not the size that counts, but really, it is...).  If you contract through review sites like Business2Blogger, this will make your site more alluring to businesses.

Although some say you can't manipulate your own SEO or page ranking, others say you can.  Whether you can or cannot, you should at least know where you stand.

Where do YOU rank?  The results may surprise you...