What are the similarities and differences between Alexa Rank and Google Rank?

[emmawatson]

[Kiran]

google gets their info by whoever uses google

alexa gets their info from whoever uses the alexa toolbar

[Car Guy]

The way Google ranks sites is not officially known by anyone other than a few top level Google people. If it became public knowledge, everyone would have the #1 spot for their searches. Some common assumptions are that they rank on things like content, page titles, what words are bold (indicates importance), and inbound links to your site among other things.

I believe Alexa ranks are based on the number of people using things like the Alexa toolbar who visit each site. It's not very accurate in terms of the number of visitors, but can give you a general idea. Basically someone using the Alexa toolbar is automatically sending information back to Alexa about what sites they go on, and Alexa compiles the sites from all their users to determine rank.

[Side]

I'm not an SEO expert, but from what I know, Alexa rank utilizes information and frequency of visits based on users who have installed the Alexa Toolbar. Google Rank (Page Rank?), uses other information such as # of inbound links, the strength of the sites linking to that site (i.e. a link from Yahoo.com may be worth more than a link from mynewsiteIjustmadeup.com) and information from the Google Toolbar. The biggest difference is that the Alexa rank sample size is much smaller, and not necessarily a valid example of normal users since only "industry" people would have the Alex Toolbar.