Last Monday I posted a sneak preview of the Wikio Parent Blog Rankings for May. Not everyone is interested in where they are placed on a list and, for many, these rankings are a source of much amusement and discussion. I opened up the floor for comments which generated some questions about the validity of the Wikio rankings. I took these questions back to Wikio Top Blogs and Neila Metz kindly offered some feedback.
How is a blog placed in the Wikio ranking? The position of a blog in the Wikio ranking depends on the number and weight of the incoming links from other blogs. These links are dynamic, which means that they are backlinks or links found within articles.
How do you move up (or down) the rankings? The weight of a link depends on the linking blog’s position in the Wikio ranking. With our algorithm, the weight of a link from a blog that is more highly ranked is greater than that of a link from a blog that is less well ranked.
Which links do you use? What about links in the sidebars of blogs? Only links found in the RSS feed are included. Blogrolls are not taken into account, and the weight of any given link increases according to how recently it was published.
So what really is the point of these rankings? We hope to provide a classification that is more representative of the current influence levels of the blogs
Why do you have some US blogs in a UK ranking list? Having US parenting blog in the UK ranking is not normal. It is hard for us to always know where bloggers come from. If you notice some US blogs, please let us know, they will be moved to the US ranking for the next month.
Are one or two of the blogs in the list considered to be 'commercial'? Commercial blogs should not be in the ranking. We verify blogs before to add them, but sometimes we miss it! Please let us know at Wikio if you think a blog is commercial and we will remove it from the list.
How does a blog become registered to be considered for the rankings? To be listed on Wikio, blogs must submit themselves: http://www.wikio.co.uk/addsource
If you really wanted to try and influence your place in the rankings then I'm sure it is possible but is it really worth it? I am interested in the growth of my blog. I want to know what my readers enjoy and what they don't and rankings and metrics show that alongside any number of analytics tools. However, rankings are just a small part of blogging. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that it is actually only the parent blogging world that appears to be obsessed by these rankings and if you don't want to be included in them, then ask to be removed from those lists.
Maybe it is just that parent bloggers are a bit more vocal on the subject or maybe we are all shouting into the same void and only hearing each other? Content has to be interesting for any blog to gain popularity. Why would other bloggers want to link to you otherwise?