Alexa Changes the Way They Rank Websites

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If you noticed a change in your Alexa ranking overnight, it probably has absolutely nothing to do with anything you’ve done on your Website.  Whether you’ve gone down or up, you can thank Alexa for changing the way they do business. Loathed by some and used as a yardstick to determine advertising rates by others, bloggers and site owners can’t afford to ignore Alexa’s traffic data - irrespective of how they report it.The most obvious change is that Alexa will no longer rely solely on toolbar users to gather traffic.  Rather, they’ll be aggregating data from “multiple sources.”  Because of this, you temporarily can’t access data dating back more than nine months.  This is expected to change as the system recalculates.

By not relying solely on their toolbar, Alexa instantly becomes a more viable data source.  However, many Websites - especially technology-related ones (where users were more likely to have downloaded the toolbar) - might not be happy about the change.  The majority have seen their Alexa rating creep upwards (not a good thing).

With 10 years of ranking experience (a true Internet Senior Citizen!), we should all give Alexa a fair chance to evolve and adapt.  It took them a long time to come around, but at the end of the day, we really have no choice.

Expect more features to be rolled out over the coming weeks and months.

Tagged with: alexa , ranking , traffic