Alexa ranks are determined in a similar manner to how TV ratings are generated. It tracks the browsing habits of a small portion of the population that are monitored through a client-side installed browser toolbar and then multiplied by the estimated total Internet user population to determine total traffic to a particular website.

Alexa Rank is important to you because major advertising networks such as AdBrite and Text Link Ads use Alexa ratings regularly to price advertising on publisher websites —thus if your site has higher Alexa Rank, more income for you. In short, you should be always aware of your Alexa ranking, and learn the basic steps on how to increase Alexa rank for your blog/webpage.

Most publishers are aware that Alexa stats are inaccurate. Basically Alexa ranking offers publishers a traffic ranking system that allows publishers to compare their website traffics with others; the lower the number of Alexa ranking the better. For example, your site is ranked 100,000 – it’s considered less popular as compared to a site that is ranked 50,000.

As per Alexa: Alexa’s traffic rankings are based on the usage patterns of Alexa Toolbar users over a rolling 3 month period. A site’s ranking is based on a combined measure of reach and pageviews. Reach is determined by the number of unique Alexa users who visit a site on a given day. Pageviews are the total number of Alexa user URL requests for a site. However, multiple requests for the same URL on the same day by the same user are counted as a single pageview. The site with the highest combination of users and pageviews is ranked #1.

Here are 10 simple ways to increase Alexa rank for your site:

1. Install an Alexa widget on your blog. With Alexa widget, it helps log visitors traffic to your site for Alexa purposes. With Alexa widget installed, your Alexa rank is more accurate and probably much higher in rank.

2. Install Alexa Toolbar on your IE browser. If you are using Internet Explorer, visit Alexa Download Page and download the Alexa Toolbar. If you’re using Firefox, download the SearchStatus extension which displays the Alexa Rank, Google PageRank, Compete Rank as well as other useful features.

I highly recommend that you use Firefox and SearchStatus instead of Alexa toolbar, which I find to be more bulky and less useful.

3. Encourage your readers to install Alexa Toolbar. Since Alexa tracks visitors by using Alexa Toolbar, thus the best way to increase your rank is to increase the number of visitors to your site that use the Alexa Toolbar. Thus, if your visitors use the toolbar and visit your site then your rank will improve dramatically.

4. Submit your post to Social Bookmarking. Lists are great to link to and always receive lots of traffic. Even though these geeks may not click on any of your advertisements or purchase anything through your affiliate links, they will surely help to improve your Alexa ranking.

5. Use PPC Campaign. Well if you have the extra cash.

6. Post to Forum. Forums such as DigitalPoint and WebMasterWorld are some of the forums where you can gain more insight of SEO and meet new friend.

7. Encourage your readers to write review. If your readers love your blog then encourage them to write review at Alexa.

8. Optimize your site for search engine. It is always good to optimize your blog for search engine. More traffic from SERP, will drive up your Alexa rank too. (Check out : 10 Simple Tips to increase traffic from Search Engines to Your Blog and 10 ways to Make Money with Technorati)

9. Create more unique and interesting content. Enough said.

10. Join the Alexa Redirect Train. Let’s have fun with the one way super express Shinkansen bullet train from Japan.