Search engine optimization is sort of like going back to junior high all over again. Popularity is paramount.
This is because the programmers for search engines like Google are really, really smart. They know that the best code that they can write is still outclassed by the average website visitor who can quickly tell if a website is user-friendly and interesting.
So search engine programmers decided to harness the collective knowledge of these website visitors by factoring the popularity of a website into that site’s search engine ranking. The programmers figure that if lots of other people are linking to your site, well, you must have something interesting there.
Consequently, the quantity of links coming into your site has a huge impact on your site’s ranking on Google.
What do the cool kids think?
Search engine programmers also know that what the cool kids think always counts for a whole lot more.
In the online realm, a large, powerful, and very popular website is unlikely to refer its visitors to boring or hard to use websites. The fact is that this became large and popular by providing its readers with great content, and so this website has every reason NOT to link to poor websites. In addition, the people behind popular websites tend to know their industry very well and have many top quality sites to point their readers towards.
The search engine programmers take this into account by weighting links from popular websites much more heavily than links from small, unpopular websites.
So online, just as in junior high, popularity counts. The difference is that this time there is a very good reason (and lots of smart programmers) behind it.
