Blog ranking services are kind of funny. In the end how they rank you really doesn't matter. I have always assumed that because most of them pull data from stuff like how many blogs Technorati thinks link to you, or how many visits per day you "should be getting" based on backlinks. I still use the occasionally go check out the Truth Laid Bear for example to see where I sit, although TTLB seems to be up and down and not real reliable.
Not only that but I like seeing actual traffic and statistics as well as demographics. It's not necessarily as important on some of my sites as it is on the ones that are monetized but I still like to see who's visiting me and how often. Just one of those control things I guess.
I started using Izea Ranks a few months ago to see how well they work. I use MyBlogLog, Google Analytics and IZEARanks. Why three? I wanted to see how accurate they were. They all show slightly different statistics but are somewhat close to my own. The thing about any of these is that generally their code is loaded via JavaScript so if the portion of the page never gets loaded that the JavaScript is listed on, that visit never gets counted.
Anyhow, so far I like IZEARanks. They rank the blogosphere (or the portion that's using IZEARanks) using real traffic and link data rather than just extrapolating the information using some kind of formula which may or may not be even close to the truth. What's really cool is the fact that the algorithm used to find RealRank is public, not some hidden page ranking score that you don't have any idea how to come up with it.
Really though, where you rank and how many visits you get isn't as important as enjoying myself is. That's the bottom line. What kind of satisfaction I get in return for the time I put into my site is much more important than any rank, whether it's found by real numbers or mathematical formulas.
