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By khalid on August 26, 2008 1:24 am
Posted in (SEO)

TopRank published a list of the top SEO blogs by RSS membership back in April of this year. And while RSS membership is a great indicator of how powerful a blog is, there are few other factors to measure the power and reach of a blog. So, for the purposes of this post, we will list the top SEO blogs based on several criteria:

1. By RSS membership

2. By number of incoming links

3. By the number of pages posted on the blog

4. By the ratio links to pages: since incoming links target specific pages on a blog, we will analyze which of the SEO blogs was able to attract the most links per post.

5. Unique monthly visitors: how many visitors did the blog receive during the last month. The data provided here is captured based on unique visitor numbers from Compete.

6. By Pages per visit: how many pages does a visitor navigate through prior to exiting the site. The data provided here is captured based on last month page per visit numbers from Compete

7. Ratio of visitors to pages: my assumption is that sites with more pages or with pages that rank for more keywords will receive more visitors. This ratio will indicate how many visitors different site pages are able to attract.

8. By Google page rank

9. The ultimate rank: This will provide a weighted average based on how well a site ranks for five of the above factors. These factors are

  • RSS
  • Incoming links
  • Pages
  • Monthly visitors
  • Pages per visit
  • Google PR

For the purposes of this blog, I only considered 25 different blogs. If you think I missed a blog or you would like to add one to the list, please leave it in the comments.

Top SEO Blogs By RSS membership

Matt Cutts

SEOmoz

Search Engine Land

Search Engine Watch

Search Engine Roundtable

Search Engine Journal

Online Marketing Blog

Search Engine Guide

Marketing Pilgrim

Pronet Advertising

Graywolf’s SEO Blog

Get Elastic

Small Business SEM

BlogStorm

Web Analytics World

SEO Scoop

SEO Pedia

techipedia

Top SEO blogs by number of incoming links:

image For the purposes of incoming links, we used Yahoo site explorer to report the number of incoming links to a blog. Couple of things to note here:

  • We used the blog URL address,
  • We excluded links from the domain it self

On the surface the number of incoming links seems like a good way to measure the power of a blog. Yet it has some major problems since some of the blogs might be able to attract links by guest posting, being an editor on another large blog, or by getting included in a blog roll of another blog. For the purposes of our ultimate rank, we gave the number of incoming links a less value in the final calculation.

Rank

Blog

Number of links

1

Online Marketing Blog

720,071

2

Search Engine Land

588,613

3

SEO Book

442,735

4

Pronet Advertising

315,348

5

Matt Cutts

299,977

6

techipedia

263,171

7

Search Engine Roundtable

247,050

8

Marketing Pilgrim

244,118

9

Search Engine Guide

222,150

10

Search Engine Journal

183,156

11

Search Engine Watch

183,121

12

SEO Scoop

129,477

13

Graywolf’s SEO Blog

107,993

14

Small Business SEM

94,560

15

Stuntdubl.com

79,438

16

BlogStorm

74,386

17

David Naylor

68,722

18

SEO by SEA

59,656

19

SEO Black Hat

57,117

20

SEOmoz

53,466

21

SEO Pedia

36,300

22

Web Analytics World

28,329

23

Get Elastic

27,653

24

Blue hat SEO

21,865

25

PPC Discussions

16,426

Top SEO blogs by the number of pages posted on the blog

Rank
Blog
Number of pages
1
David Naylor 41,030
2
Search Engine Land 31,756
3
Search Engine Guide 22,757
4
Search Engine Roundtable 15,185
5
Search Engine Watch 14,697
6
Search Engine Journal 12,816
7
SEO Book 11,568
8
Marketing Pilgrim 11,464
9
Matt Cutts 4306
10
SEOmoz 3,973
11
SEO Black Hat 3,383
12
SEO by SEA 3,383
13
Small Business SEM 3,257
14
Online Marketing Blog 2,779
15
Graywolf’s SEO Blog 2,420
16
SEO Scoop 2,372
17
Stuntdubl.com 2,038
18
Get Elastic 1,926
19
BlogStorm 1,577
20
SEO Pedia 1,540
21
Web Analytics World 1,264
22
Pronet Advertising 998
23
PPC Discussions 629
24
Blue hat SEO 582
25
techipedia 392

Top SEO blogs by number of links to pages ratio

The purpose of this ratio is to measure how well a blog is able to attract links for each post. Attracting 100 links per post is a lot more powerful than attracting 10 links per post.

Rank Blog Links to pages ratio
1 techipedia

671

2 Pronet Advertising

316

3 Online Marketing Blog

259

4 Matt Cutts

70

5 SEO Scoop

55

6 BlogStorm

47

7 Graywolf’s SEO Blog

45

8 Stuntdubl.com

39

9 SEO Book

38

10 Blue hat seo

38

11 Small Business SEM

29

12 PPC Discussions

26

13 SEO Pedia

24

14 Web Analytics World

22

15 Marketing Pilgrim

21

16 Search Engine Land

19

17 SEO by SEA

18

18 SEO Black Hat

17

19 Search Engine Roundtable

16

20 Get Elastic

14

21 Search Engine Journal

14

22 SEOmoz

13

23 Search Engine Watch

12

24 Search Engine Guide

10

25 David Naylor

2

Top SEO blogs by unique monthly visitors

This data is based on numbers reported from Compete.

Rank Blog Unique visitors
1 SEO Book

560,065

2 SEOmoz

536,021

3 Search Engine Watch

501,361

4 Search Engine Land

472,874

5 Matt Cutts

329,102

6 Search Engine Roundtable

326,519

7 Search Engine Journal

297,149

8 Search Engine Guide

184,987

9 Marketing Pilgrim

167,495

10 Graywolf’s SEO Blog

130,151

11 Online Marketing Blog

124,060

12 BlogStorm

115,723

13 SEO Black Hat

81,589

14 Get Elastic

78,079

15 David Naylor

71,127

16 Small Business SEM

71,077

17 Blue hat SEO

62,713

18 Pronet Advertising

56,513

19 techipedia

53,374

20 SEO Scoop

50,927

21 SEO by SEA

46,536

22 Stuntdubl.com

43,845

23 Web Analytics World

16,698

24 SEO Pedia

14,454

25 PPC Discussions

12,448

Top SEO blogs by pages per visit

Rank Blog Pages per visit
1 SEOmoz

4.1

2 SEO Book

3.7

3 SEO Black Hat

3.4

4 PPC Discussions

2.4

5 Stuntdubl.com

2.3

6 Matt Cutts

2.2

7 Search Engine Land

2.2

8 Search Engine Watch

2.2

9 Marketing Pilgrim

2.2

10 SEO Pedia

2.1

11 Blue hat SEO

2

12 Search Engine Roundtable

1.9

13 Search Engine Guide

1.9

14 Pronet Advertising

1.8

15 Graywolf’s SEO Blog

1.8

16 Get Elastic

1.8

17 David Naylor

1.8

18 Online Marketing Blog

1.7

19 Search Engine Journal

1.6

20 Small Business SEM

1.6

21 SEO Scoop

1.5

22 techipedia

1.4

23 BlogStorm

1.3

24 SEO by SEA

1.3

25 Web Analytics World

1.2

Top SEO blogs by ratio of visitors to pages

This ratio is calculated by dividing the number of unique visitors the blog received from last month by the number of pages in the blog. A more powerful page is able to attract more traffic.

Rank Blog Visitors to pages
1 techipedia

136

2 SEOmoz

135

3 Blue hat seo

108

4 Matt Cutts

76

5 BlogStorm

73

6 Pronet Advertising

57

7 Graywolf’s SEO Blog

54

8 SEO Book

48

9 Online Marketing Blog

45

10 Get Elastic

41

11 Search Engine Watch

34

12 SEO Black Hat

24

13 Search Engine Journal

23

14 Small Business SEM

22

15 Stuntdubl.com

22

16 Search Engine Roundtable

22

17 SEO Scoop

21

18 PPC Discussions

20

19 Search Engine Land

15

20 Marketing Pilgrim

15

21 SEO by SEA

14

22 Web Analytics World

13

23 SEO Pedia

9

24 Search Engine Guide

8

25 David Naylor

2

Top SEO blogs by Google PR

Love it or hate it, Google PR indicates what Google thinks of a site.

Blog

PR

Matt Cutts

7

Search Engine Land

7

Search Engine Watch

7

SEOmoz

6

Search Engine Journal

6

Online Marketing Blog

6

Search Engine Guide

6

Marketing Pilgrim

6

Pronet Advertising

6

Graywolf’s SEO Blog

6

Get Elastic

6

SEO Book

6

Stuntdubl.com

6

Small Business SEM

5

BlogStorm

5

SEO Scoop

5

SEO Black Hat

5

SEO by SEA

5

Blue hat SEO

5

Search Engine Roundtable

4

Web Analytics World

4

PPC Discussions

4

David Naylor

4

techipedia

4

SEO Pedia

3

SEO Blogs: The ultimate rank

This will provide a weighted average based on how well a site ranks for 5 of the above factors. These factors are

  1. RSS: RSS membership is given 120% weight in the ultimate rank evaluation.
  2. Number of incoming links: Number of incoming links is given 10% weight in the ultimate rank evaluation.
  3. Pages: Number of pages published on a blog is given 50% weight in the ultimate rank evaluation.
  4. Unique monthly visitors: Number of unique monthly visitors is given 100% weight in the ultimate rank evaluation.
  5. Pages per visit: Number of pages per visit is given 120% weight in the ultimate rank evaluation.
  6. Google PR: is given 50% weight in the ultimate rank evaluation.

Final note: some of the major blogs that don’t report (mainly SEObook) their number of RSS subscribers will rank lower in this list.

Based on the above formula, here is the ultimate rank values for the top SEO blogs

Rank Blog

Final score

1 SEOmoz

103.4

2 Search Engine Land

100.5

3 Matt Cutts

98.1

4 Search Engine Watch

97.9

5 Search Engine Roundtable

89.5

6 SEO Book

86

7 Search Engine Guide

85.2

8 Marketing Pilgrim

84.2

9 Search Engine Journal

83.4

10 Online Marketing Blog

76.8

11 Graywolf’s SEO Blog

72.5

12 SEO Black Hat

68.7

13 Get Elastic

64.8

14 Pronet Advertising

63.1

15 David Naylor

63

16 Small Business SEM

62.1

17 BlogStorm

58.1

18 Stuntdubl.com

55.7

19 Blue hat SEO

52.2

20 SEO Scoop

52

21 SEO Pedia

50.1

22 PPC Discussions

48.9

23 SEO by SEA

46.4

24 techipedia

45

25 Web Analytics World

42.6

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34 Responses to “ Top SEO blogs: The Ultimate Rank”

 
Lee Odden Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 1:49 am

That’s quite a bit of work you’ve done there Khalid, well done. The news blogs have a bit of an advantage in some areas like pages viewed and ability to draw traffic because they update so often, but it looks pretty balanced overall to me. :)

 
Anuj Seth Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 2:29 am

Excellent compilation!

 
The Top SEO Blogs | Online Presence - Let's Make Money Online Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 2:35 am

[...] has an excellent compilation of the best SEO blogs based on various [...]

 
Patrick Altoft Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 2:54 am

Pretty detailed way of doing the rankings, I’m not sure the Yahoo data about pages on the site is correct though.

 
Top SEO blogs: The Ultimate Rank Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 3:33 am

[...] is the original: Top SEO blogs: The Ultimate Rank Categories : Google No comments [...]

 
DazzlinDonna Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 8:34 am

Patrick is right. Data is badly skewed, especially for the DaveN pages. (sneaky, dave, sneaky…grin).

 
rjleaman Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 9:22 am

Facinating numbers – and a pile of work! I think that here you’ve laid out an interesting formula by which any blogger could measure their own status (and changes to status, by way of progress over time). The ratio measurements (incoming links per page on site, for example) are particularly useful! But I am curious about the thought process behind the specific weights given to each of those factors in the final analysis: not questioning the percentages, mind you – just can’t help wondering how you arrived at them?

 
Jeremy Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 11:31 am

Thanks for the mention and all the work that went into putting this list together.

Jeremy

 
Pilgrim’s Picks for August 26 - Who Stole the News Edition? Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 11:46 am

[...] not checked the accuracy of the data, but you have to be impressed with Khalid’s attempt to provide the “Ultimate Rank” of SEO blogs. Yeah, it’s linkbait, yeah he’s [...]

 
Linda Bustos Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 12:20 pm

WOW that’s an interesting collection. I’m intrigued by the combined scores of all these different factors.

My favorite metric is the links to pages ratio – great job Tamar. I think that shows a better idea of how well a site’s content can spark conversation and influence others, rather than absolute links that depends on # of posts and age of a blog.

I also find Matt Cutts’ # of pages commendable, seeing his blog is not multi-author.

 
Herb Firestone Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 5:02 pm

I agree with Lee Odden. That was a lot of work. It was hard enough just to scroll all the way down to the comments. Speaking of which, shouldn’t the average number of comments per post and the overall ability to generate comments count for something? And finally, I can think of three blogs without even trying that were left out. Stephan Spencer Scatterings, Dosh Dosh, and Web Pro News. They may not be 100% dedicated to seo, but they should still make the top 25 SEO blogs.

 
Jaan Kanellis Says -- August 26th, 2008 at 8:54 pm

Looks like the cream did rise to the top.

 
Utah SEO Says -- August 27th, 2008 at 11:10 am

I like how you put these different scoring factors together I was hoping this wasn’t just going to name the same few we always see.

 
SEO Canada Says -- August 27th, 2008 at 12:18 pm

Your missing Beanstalk’s SEO blog under SEO Blogs by Pagerank it is a PR5. Cheers.

 
 
SearchCap: The Day In Search, August 27, 2008 Says -- August 27th, 2008 at 6:51 pm

[...] Top SEO blogs: The Ultimate Rank, The Invesp Blog [...]

 
khalid Says -- August 27th, 2008 at 7:02 pm

@Lee Odden, glad you liked the post. This work ate up good chunk of last Saturday but I finally wrote a program to automate most of it now.

 
khalid Says -- August 27th, 2008 at 7:12 pm

@rjleaman you ask very valid questions. I tried to balance value I assigned each factor based on how easy the blog can achieve that factor or how easy it is to manipulate it. I also used a little bit of analysis I had completed while working a while ago on a ranking program for a software company.

I think what is different in the calculation I did was to use a relative value based on the ranking the blog received amongst the top 25 blogs. So, ranking in the 1st position for RSS membership granted the blog more points than ranking in 1st position for number of incoming links.

I have been trying to come up with a good way to generalize the formula so any blogger can use it on their blog to relatively measure their success.

@Linda I thought Tamar did a great job in showing how to attract links to her posts. I have couple of other factors that measure the growth of a blog which I think getElastic wins hands down.

@Herb Firestone thanks for the comment. I will add these blogs to the list next time I redo the list. I came up with an automated way to generate the list so I hope it does not take me that long to regenerate it.

@SEO Canada I am starting to think I should remove Google PR or exclude blogs under PR of 6. any thoughts?

 
 
lestmango Says -- August 28th, 2008 at 12:01 am

Great compilation of blogs. Excellent work!

 
خرید پستی Says -- August 30th, 2008 at 7:18 am

Great post on a subject dear to my heart (and wallet)

 
European Cats Says -- September 1st, 2008 at 10:44 pm

Great post. I appreciate this post. Thanks for sharing this post. Keep it up

 
online dating software Says -- September 5th, 2008 at 12:48 am

I can think of three blogs without even trying that were left out.

 
houseofseo.com » Blog Archive SearchCap: The Day In Search, August 27, 2008 Says -- September 6th, 2008 at 2:38 pm

[...] Top SEO blogs: The Ultimate Rank, The Invesp Blog [...]

 
Hidayah Anka Says -- September 6th, 2008 at 6:59 pm

Thank you so much dare to share….
bunch of top quality content blog that should be subcribe and learn from it.@#$%……….

 
affiliate marketing Says -- September 12th, 2008 at 8:15 am

That is a really good thorough list and interesting to see who each category they rank differently for.

 
Egbsystems Says -- September 16th, 2008 at 2:22 pm

wow.. What a Great post..

Thanks for the top Blog website list.

 
John H. Gohde Says -- September 29th, 2008 at 5:54 pm

A great list. And, an even better post. I am going to have check out every site on your list.

 
 
blogging services Says -- November 11th, 2008 at 12:43 am

Number really speaks. If you got a number of visitor, then your blog is effective. No more other criterion greater than this.

 
martha Says -- November 21st, 2008 at 1:52 am

Really nice compilation of the top blog list..

 
Matt Wutzke Says -- January 10th, 2009 at 10:45 pm

Thanks for going into so much detail in your review! I’ll have to make sure to go to things like that in future, as it seems like you can learn a lot!

 
Geetha Says -- March 25th, 2009 at 7:37 am

Great collection! It would be really great to get listed here.. Thanks for your valuable post..

 
Announcing Invesp’s blogRank | The Invesp Blog: E-commerce and Landing page Optimization Says -- May 4th, 2009 at 11:18 am

[...] application was inspired by a post I wrote few months ago, listing the SEO blogs. As bloggers, we always wonder how to measure our own progress and success. Different bloggers use [...]

 

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