I posted this in a VIP post, but I figured this would be good to post here too. Using these steps, I have helped people save thousands of dollars when looking up domains for sale, and services selling posts on these domains.
- Today, PR checkers are shit. They simply don't pick up the 301 redirect PR scam (which I won't explain). So not only do we have numerous PR4+ domains for sale, we have numerous services selling links and posts on these useless domains.
- Some people selling are just clueless, while most just don't care and want to make a buck.
- For the ones that are clueless, they really shouldn't have any business selling these domains if they don't understand they are fake.
- PR is ONLY a guideline, it's not the best tool to use to actually evaluate a site. SEOmoz's opensiteexplorer.org is a better evaluator, but it is also flawed. But it's a good step to start at to see the actual value of a domain. The ideal way to evaluate a domain is doing it yourself using several different tools. Find as many backlinks as you can and check the quality of them.
Steps to identifying fake PR. (With some quality checks mixed in.)
Step 1: Fuck all the page rank checkers you know.
Step 2: Enter site at: www.opensiteexplorer.org, do both www.site.com and site.com, just to make sure.
a) A PR of 5 or more should have a DA of atleast 50, usually 60+. Rare cases it will be below 50. But in reality, you want a high DA.
b) It should have a wide variety of links from different domains. Not a handful of domains, unless one of those links are a legit PR7+!
c) The majority of links shouldn't be from blog comments.
d) Sometimes OSE will even notify you that the domain was 301 redirected (which gives the fake PR)
Step 3: Go to archive.org and check the history of the domain. PR5+ will have quality sites, with good content (majority of the time). Sometimes you can even spot the 301 redirect in here as well.
Step 4: Go to ahrefs.com and check the history of the backlinks. Often people trying to rip you off will build the majorit of links within the past few weeks to build up the link profile. This is why OSE is good, it only updates monthly, so usually the new links won't show.
Step 5: go to www.majesticseo.com and www.backlinkwatch.com and check links again. Make sure it's not solely based on comments and other shit links. Make sure there are no homepage network links. Any incoming links from the homepage, check the page, make sure it's not a paid link. Some sellers will buy a ton of homepage links for a month or two, sell the domain, and stop paying for the homepage links. The real PR5+ you want will have links from respectable domains.
Step 6: Enter the site in Google. Check those site stats sites, often they will take a screen shot of the site, and if you catch it at the right time, it will show the site which it was 301 redirected to. (I usually only do this step if I want to call the seller out and show more proof it's fake)
If you want to test this out, go look at almost any PR3+ domain for sale in the DP marketplace, they are almost all fake. Fucking scammers.
Age is not usally a big factor, because a domain can be dropped and still keep it's PR. However, ideally you'll want it aged, so it keeps it's age as well as PR/value.
Now if you're looking to buy a high quality expired domain, you will want to do the same above steps. But you'll want to examine as many backlinks as you can, and as closely as you can. You want to avoid the sites that are majority blog comments, profiles, paid links, etc. You want to try and find domains that have legit incoming links from other sites, it might be blogroll, mention in a blog, etc. But you also have to make sure they aren't paid. If you see domain in blogroll of a site, and you see other sites that are unrelated, then it was obviously a paid link, and it's only a matter of time before the link is removed. Also, you'll also find pages that are supposed to have links to the site, but when you check the page, the link has already been removed. The link was removed usually because it was a) a paid links or b) because the domain (you're looking to register) had expired and the site owner removed the link.
I have picked up dozens of PR2-PR5 domains that have expired.I put up a new site, and the PR comes back within a week or two.
Hope this keeps some of you from getting ripped off and looking closer at what you are buying.
- Today, PR checkers are shit. They simply don't pick up the 301 redirect PR scam (which I won't explain). So not only do we have numerous PR4+ domains for sale, we have numerous services selling links and posts on these useless domains.
- Some people selling are just clueless, while most just don't care and want to make a buck.
- For the ones that are clueless, they really shouldn't have any business selling these domains if they don't understand they are fake.
- PR is ONLY a guideline, it's not the best tool to use to actually evaluate a site. SEOmoz's opensiteexplorer.org is a better evaluator, but it is also flawed. But it's a good step to start at to see the actual value of a domain. The ideal way to evaluate a domain is doing it yourself using several different tools. Find as many backlinks as you can and check the quality of them.
Steps to identifying fake PR. (With some quality checks mixed in.)
Step 1: Fuck all the page rank checkers you know.
Step 2: Enter site at: www.opensiteexplorer.org, do both www.site.com and site.com, just to make sure.
a) A PR of 5 or more should have a DA of atleast 50, usually 60+. Rare cases it will be below 50. But in reality, you want a high DA.
b) It should have a wide variety of links from different domains. Not a handful of domains, unless one of those links are a legit PR7+!
c) The majority of links shouldn't be from blog comments.
d) Sometimes OSE will even notify you that the domain was 301 redirected (which gives the fake PR)
Step 3: Go to archive.org and check the history of the domain. PR5+ will have quality sites, with good content (majority of the time). Sometimes you can even spot the 301 redirect in here as well.
Step 4: Go to ahrefs.com and check the history of the backlinks. Often people trying to rip you off will build the majorit of links within the past few weeks to build up the link profile. This is why OSE is good, it only updates monthly, so usually the new links won't show.
Step 5: go to www.majesticseo.com and www.backlinkwatch.com and check links again. Make sure it's not solely based on comments and other shit links. Make sure there are no homepage network links. Any incoming links from the homepage, check the page, make sure it's not a paid link. Some sellers will buy a ton of homepage links for a month or two, sell the domain, and stop paying for the homepage links. The real PR5+ you want will have links from respectable domains.
Step 6: Enter the site in Google. Check those site stats sites, often they will take a screen shot of the site, and if you catch it at the right time, it will show the site which it was 301 redirected to. (I usually only do this step if I want to call the seller out and show more proof it's fake)
If you want to test this out, go look at almost any PR3+ domain for sale in the DP marketplace, they are almost all fake. Fucking scammers.
Age is not usally a big factor, because a domain can be dropped and still keep it's PR. However, ideally you'll want it aged, so it keeps it's age as well as PR/value.
Now if you're looking to buy a high quality expired domain, you will want to do the same above steps. But you'll want to examine as many backlinks as you can, and as closely as you can. You want to avoid the sites that are majority blog comments, profiles, paid links, etc. You want to try and find domains that have legit incoming links from other sites, it might be blogroll, mention in a blog, etc. But you also have to make sure they aren't paid. If you see domain in blogroll of a site, and you see other sites that are unrelated, then it was obviously a paid link, and it's only a matter of time before the link is removed. Also, you'll also find pages that are supposed to have links to the site, but when you check the page, the link has already been removed. The link was removed usually because it was a) a paid links or b) because the domain (you're looking to register) had expired and the site owner removed the link.
I have picked up dozens of PR2-PR5 domains that have expired.I put up a new site, and the PR comes back within a week or two.
Hope this keeps some of you from getting ripped off and looking closer at what you are buying.
Last edited:
