Page specific external followed links
-
Hi,
I'm using Site Explorer to research my website but the stats don't have up!
Page Specific - External Followed Links: 11
Sub Domain - External Followed Links: 40
Root Domain - External Followed Links: 40Total links: 1,733
Total links on webmaster tools: 781How does this add up? Why am I getting varied results.. And what is the difference between Page, Sub and Root when I only tested www.mysite.com?
Any help would be great!
Shaun
-
This has given me something to focus on, I know most of this stuff in the back on my head but haven't understood where to go. This is great. Thanks again
-
I always get a little twitchy when I see a question involve the words 'focus upon' when it comes to SEO - though I will do my best to answer in a moment: however my best advice is never just worry about one thing EXCEPT if that 1 thing is converted business (however you measure that, sales, read posts, whatever); EVERYTHING else is merely a means to that end.
Out of the two, external and internal links, you would generally want to look to get more EXTERNAL links.
Internal links should take care of themselves as you add new content etc; there are things you can do to perhaps help your internal navigation to provide good links internally which would also help the search engines identify more important pages (used to be allied to PR sculpting, which has varied opinions now on its effectiveness); as with everything, if there is a good USER experience reason for doing the internal link, then do it; if there isn't a good user reason don't.
Good links are, at least to some degree, subjective. What you call a good link I may not, and vise-versa (My best link choice is the one I will list last :)). But in general, a good link for me is one that is:
On a page that is indexed by the search engines (a good start); spending time on getting links on pages not indexed is not a good thing (you could also say you want higher PR pages, which is fair enough, but not the whole story)
On a page that does not have LOTs of other links
On a page where your competitors will find it hard to get on there (the easier it is for 'anyone' to get a link there chances are the less value it will have.
On a page relevant to you topic/niche.
the biggie
My best link advice is: the one that will bring you business. Forget the 'backlink juice' completely; will it bring you a lead that you convert into business. If yes, then that is the killer backlink - give me that one every time. I don't care if it in a directory, a blog post, a forum reply, anything anywhere - if it brings me business I like it!!!!!! And guess what, if it is doing that I would put money on it being likely to be liked by the search engines too.
There are I am sure many more things that would make a 'good' backlink, but hopefully these will help you out for a while. These are the ones I 'work' for; the others I may take as I stumble upon them; but not to work hard at getting.
-
Thanks for your answer Kevin, that sums things up nicely for me.
Going on from what you have said, what should I focus on as a guide, either total links or total external followed links? I will view them more generally now as a comparison to my competitors.
Also, when you say 'good links' there is no tab for this (obviously, although that would be nice) so how would you know which were good/bad?
-
Shaun,
with regards to the varied results: this is normal.
Specificially:
With regards to the total number of backlinks: Google doesn't offer 100% up-to-date information, they like to keep some information obscured, and obviously OSE doesn't necessarily know about every backlink that Google does (and possibly knows some Google doesn't yet) - and even then Moz themselves say that they don't try to find every link on every site.Either way you should only ever take link counts as a guide FROM WHATEVER SOURCE. In addition, I wouldn't focus too much on pure numbers - that way lays madness - care about the 'good' links only. (Though I don't like the way Google is going myself; latest algo changes seem to have opposite of stated desired effects)
The difference between page, sub-domain and domain are these:
Page - this is the exact page you type in, whether it is the home page or not - but www.yourdomain.com is a page in its own right, just like any other as well as being a sub-domain.
Sub-domain: www.yourdomain.com is a sub-domain though we don't normally think of it like that (you could have completely different websites on yourdomain.com vs www.yourdomain.com just like you could sub.domain.com) - so any links coming in to ANY PAGE on www.yourdomain.com would count here.
Domain: following on from the above; any link coming in to the domain yourdomain.com OR any sub-domain would be counted here. Once again, because the vast majority of sites use www this rarely gets considered (especially when we 301-redirect from one to the other) and for most sites I would expect the 'domain' and 'sub-domain' counts to be the same.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Should my backlinks point to my home page or to internal article pages?
Hi, I run a fitness blog and I get the majority of my backlinks through guest posts that I write on high quality sites. Sometimes they allow me to put a backlink within the article, and I'll link it to a relevant article of mine. However, in the "author bio" section my backlink anchor text is usually just my brand name. I was wondering if this backlink should point towards my home page or is it more beneficial to point it towards an important article of mine? Thanks
Link Building | | jeremyethier0 -
Will short linking to my site affect SERPs attribution of inbound link?
Some brand partners are using their short links to link back to our site (like bit.ly but they have their own). They have a high domain authority and trust so we want that link back to be read by Google. When I downloaded all inbound links from Moz, this brand's site was not listed, making me worried that the inbound link isn't being seen or considered! Haven't been able to find any info on this...
Link Building | | PAC31350 -
Are followed links from these high authority domains any good?
Hi Mozzers, I have a link building question, in 2 parts. I am in the UK. We have a large local directory network over here which involves some high authority national news domains. Basically, you get a citation for free but if you go "featured" as well as the benefit of being returned top for keyword searches in the directories, buried under a tab on your page are deep links to your website, and they are followed. What are the risks/benefits of this? Are followed links from other high authority domains like Visual.ly and Behance worth it? They are easy to get and I've always believed an easy link usually isn't a good link. Thanks in advance!
Link Building | | Silkstream0 -
No Follow Link Advice for a Newbie
Hi Moz-ers! 2 part question I would love suggestions to: I'm fairly new to the SEO world and working towards targets of 4 'follow' and 6 'no_follow' links a month, in house. 1. Apart from Wikipedia and bloggers that issue 'no_follow' links, what are good 'no_follow' slink generation ideas? 2. I've read lots about the benefit of no_follow and follow links and the ongoing debate, how does this target/KPI stack up against others out there? And is it a well structured target? I know its a big question, but I'd love some feedback. Big Thanks!
Link Building | | FrancescaW0 -
Should I request backlinks to use anchor text that is page specific?
I work for a community college, with fairly high seo for the college in general. We have no budget for advertising specific programs, so we are trying to optimize individual pages on the website, e.g., physical therapy assistant, welding, etc. Does it make a difference if other websites use our main url, college name, or the college name plus specific program as the anchor text? Also, I'm seeing some posts here recommending to avoid lots of directory listings. I assume that doesn't apply to industry specific directories, like nursing school directories, right? I'm still a very new newbie and appreciate your advice.
Link Building | | LAJN0 -
What does it mean by followed links?
I don't understand what SEOmoz report means when it shows I have no followed links OR linking root domains. What does this mean and how can I fix it?
Link Building | | CapitolShine0 -
Are Directory Links a Good Source of Branded Links?
I am trying to increase the number of branded links for a few of my sites since the links are too heavily weighted on anchor text. If so, would you recommend a service like Directory Maximizer?
Link Building | | rise10 -
Do No follow links from social media platforms transfer authority or value when they link to third party websites?
With social media playing a bigger role in SEO (since the Panda, Penguin updates etc) and how search engines rank sites now, does anybody know why Twitter for instance has 'no follow' when I check my client's websites under 'inbound links' on Open Site Explorer?
Link Building | | caroline19770