The Difference Between Alexa Rank and RealRank
There is a significant difference between the ranking algorithms of Alexa and RealRank by IZEA. Some bloggers are wondering why their despite the fact that their sites’ Alexa ranks are increasing, their RealRanks are not.
First let us try to look into the significance of these ranking systems. Site monetization is easier and better if your site’s pedigree is enticing to advertisers. Either you are selling links and/or doing reviews, site metrics like the Alexa Rank, RealRank, Technorati Rank and Page Rank are highly important. Previous discussions on these subjects are in the archives of this site, please feel free to search for them in the search box.
For the Alexa Rank and RealRank, I have observed that the former is more dependent on hits on the home page. This means that hits on your blog’s home page scores higher on Alexa’s algorithm. Hits on subpages of your sites are not ignored, however, they are just scored with lower “points”. This is the reason why bloggers who are active in Entrecard usually have higher Alexa Ranks than bloggers who are not or whose visitors come primarily from the search engines (where the landing pages are usually subpages of the site). This is also one of the reasons why I have written before that the Alexa Ranking system is biased and is not a good measure of real traffic. My sites’ data reveal that when many Entrecard members drop cards on my sites (which gives many hits on the home pages), Alexa Ranks of those sites are good and a steady increase hase been seen for a period of 3-4 months. If you are in doubt, try not dropping Entrecards for 2-4 weeks and see if you will experience a drop in your Alexa Ranks even if your site receives thousands of hits per day from the search engines. 
IZEA exploited this weakness in the Alexa algorithm by way of creating the RealRank. With the RealRank, the hits on the home page and subpages are given equal points. This means that whether your visitors landed on your subpages or home page, the points that your site receives over the period of scoring/ranking remain the same. This system relies more on actual page views (whatever is that page) than putting different weights on home page hits and subpage hits. If your site enjoys great traffic from search engines, you are assured of a high or increasing RealRank. On the other hand, there is no better way to validate this observation but to put it under several tests. As a challenge, try counting your visitors from Entrecard, Stumbleupon, Google, Yahoo and other sources. Determine the hits received by your home page and subpages then compare your Alexa Ranks and RealRanks. Make use of your free online monitoring software because I’m sure it will show you your main sources of traffic and the landing pages of your visitors.
If you are in the business of making money through blog advertising (doing reviews), it’s best that you strive for an improved Alexa Rank and RealRank at the same time. This is because different blog adverstising companies and advertisers require different ranks. Some prefer the Alexa rank but not the RealRank and vice versa. In my experience as a blogger, I haven’t encountered an advertiser that required both ranks yet.
If you want to get updates on Nursing Researches, Nursing Board Exam Results, Nursing Articles, Nursing Education, Health and Health tips, and other informative articles in this site, please subscribe to my Free RSS feed. Thank you very much!
Tags: Alexa Rank, Blogging, RealRank, site metrics, Statistics in Blogging
Kuya,
Thanks for posting this one. At least nagkaroon ng linaw yong confusion ni Ate Bing. SR and Buyblogreviews I think requires high Alexa rankings while PPP requires high Real Rank. And it’s true that when you get a boost in ur traffic through Entrecard, page reviews are going down because most of the visitors hit your page only to make a drop.
My site got 2, 633 visitors in the last 15 days from Entrecard, 289 from Stumble Upon and only 103 from the search engines. Most of my visitors are coming from Entrecard and the traffic boost has been amazing so far, including my Real Rank which stands at 363 for now.
Atat akong matutunan talaga ung SEO techniques, Kuya. Share mo naman ang secrets mo, hehehe!
Scotty’s Princess’s last blog post..The State of Emigration in the Philippines
[Reply]
jessie reply on July 26th, 2008:
Ellaine,
I hope can share with you some SEO secrets. Unfortunately, I don’t have any. lol! I’m not an SEO expert.
jessie’s last blog post..Denise Richards in Hawaii Shooting “It’s Complicated”, Deals With Paparazzis
[Reply]
Kuya, yon pala yon! I hardly cared to know what the difference was but always wondered. Galing mo tlaga. Thanks po. Nakakatuwa naman. How do you know all these things?!
Jennie’s last blog post..Public Opinion Site
[Reply]
jessie reply on July 26th, 2008:
Jen,
The simple answer is Statistics. I have multiple sites and I have compared all needed data across 5 sites. To be more mathematical, I used the Pearson r Product-moment correlation test containing data for 6 months comparing 2-5 sites over that period. For all the sites beyond 3 months old, I used the multiple correlation and partial correlation tests.
jessie’s last blog post..Browse the Internet Using Your Mobile Phone and Opera Mini
[Reply]
Master,
Galing galing mo talaga (two thumbs up)! Thank you for posting this one, I was really enlighten na po. GOD BLESS!
bregie’s last blog post..Someone Special Online
[Reply]
jessie reply on July 26th, 2008:
Bing,
Always my plesure to be of help to other bloggers like you.
jessie’s last blog post..Browse the Internet Using Your Mobile Phone and Opera Mini
[Reply]
Bow na bow na talaga ako sa galing mo kuya. Thanks for posting this one, thanks for enlightening us lalo na me na lang alam about sa ganitong topic. At least now alam ko na at naintindihan pa.
Oi kuya we’re going to stay here in Pinas for the meantime, read my post about it na lang in my blog. Kuya anong YM mo? tsaka phone #.. textmate tayo hahaha..
twinks’s last blog post..To Stay In Philippines For Good..?
[Reply]
jessie reply on July 26th, 2008:
Twinks, andun na sa cbox mo yung sagot.
jessie’s last blog post..Cisco Trainings Can Make Your Resumes Look Better
[Reply]
Yeah I was aware of this too fren kasi explain si hubby about this. Kung di lang busy si hubby sa work niya ay patulong ako panu SEO nayan kaso wala panahon kainis! Pati blog niya iniipis na. Pag diko pa awayin para gumawa ng opps sa blog niya dahil may offer saka pa kikilos hahaha dinamay sa bisyo. Blog2x lang ako, libangan at earn narin pag may dumating.
I just like entrecard kasi kakaaliw mapunta sa iba ibang blogs plus ok din naman pagdating sa alexa. So far real rank and alexa rank is fair naman. Wala nga ako paki kung madami ba ako traffic fren eh o wala, malay koba sa SEO nayan. Yung mga stumble upon at ek2x nayan, napapasali lang ako pag may approach pati subscribe2x RSS hehehehe. Ingganyo lang ba..explore2x ano meron at pag-aralan pag may panahon.
[Reply]
Joy,
Fren, honestly ako rin hindi ko na concern yan. Basta may pera lang ako ok na yun. Hak hak hak! Pati PR ko kahit alisin na ng Google eh ayos lang. Maybe I have matured as a blogger na.
jessie’s last blog post..Alternative Fuels Being Developed to Curb Addiction to Oil Products
[Reply]
my alexa is now under 200k. i haven’t installed the izea real rank as i noticed that it slows down loading time of my site.
my goal now is for my new ceblogger.com blog. btw, i nominated you jessie sa emerging influential blogs of 2008. i updated my list.
[Reply]
my alexa is now under 200k. i haven’t installed the izea real rank as i noticed that it slows down loading time of my site.
my goal now is for my new ceblogger.com blog. btw, i nominated you jessie sa emerging influential blogs of 2008. i updated my list.
ceblogger’s last blog post..My Blog’s New Look
[Reply]