Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Backlinks vs External Links vs Referral Links vs Outbound links
-
Hello all,
I was just wondering if you could explain the difference between all the links above? I'm confused as they all seem to be the same or similar and I would just like to clearly know what distinguishes them from eachother.
Thanks for your help,
Jayne
-
Thanks Ian - that's a great help
-
Hi there!
Let's say that you have website A, with the domain aaa.com ...
Backlinks: Any link that points to a page within website A is a backlink (at least it is from YOUR point of view). These links could come from other websites, but also from within website A
Referral Links: A referral can be a link that isn't from a crawable web. For example, a link in an email or from Facebook.
Outbound Links: Outbound links are links that are meant to take you elsewhere. These are links that are going to direct you to another specific webpage or website altogether. Most, if not all, websites have outbound links.
**External Links: **External Links are hyperlinks that point at (target) any domain other than the domain the link exists on (source). In layman's terms, if another website links to you, this is considered an external link to your site
Hope this helps!
Thanks,
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
-
link building
https://www.youtube.com/redirect?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
Link Building | | Tv2.ro
https://m.youtube.com/redirect?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://t.me/iv?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://cr.naver.com/redirect-notification?u=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://panchodeaonori.sakura.ne.jp/feed/aonori/feed2js.php?src=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/no_outbounds.php?o=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://optimize.viglink.com/page/pmv?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://hobby.idnes.cz/peruanske-palive-papricky-rocoto-dlz-/redir.aspx?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://redirects.tradedoubler.com/utm/td_redirect.php?td_keep_old_utm_value=1&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://www.kaskus.co.id/redirect?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://salesevents.madison.com/go.php?article_id=108164&dealer_id=60&ga_id&promo_id=25&source=promotion&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://bbs.pku.edu.cn/v2/jump-to.php?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://feeds.hanselman.com/~/t/0/0/scotthanselman/~/https:/antena24.ro
https://guru.sanook.com/?URL=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://keyscan.cn.edu/AuroraWeb/Account/SwitchView?returnUrl=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://bukkit.org/proxy.php?link=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://nou-rau.uem.br/nou-rau/zeus/auth.php?back=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F&go=x&code=x&unit=x
https://redirect.camfrog.com/redirect/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://auth.she.com/logout/?callback=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro&client_id=8
https://bugcrowd.com/external_redirect?site=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://wikimapia.org/external_link?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://www.earth-policy.org/?URL=https://antena24.ro
https://m.ok.ru/dk?st.cmd=outLinkWarning&st.rfn=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://m.ok.ru/dk?st.cmd=outLinkWarning&st.rfn=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://wfc2.wiredforchange.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=hdorrh%2BHcDlQ%2BzUEnZU5qlfKZ1Cl53X6&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://www.fuzokubk.com/cgi-bin/LinkO.cgi?u=antena24.ro
https://ipv4.google.com/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://ditu.google.com/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro
https://m.verywed.com/redirect.php?url=https://antena24.ro/
https://www.projekt-office.ch/?URL=https://antena24.ro
https://mobile.myprice74.ru/redirect.php?url=antena24.ro
https://www.libenar.it/?URL=https://antena24.ro/
https://feeds.osce.org/~/t/0/0/osceofficetajikistan/~/https:/antena24.ro
https://feeds.gty.org/~/t/0/0/gtyblog/~/https:/antena24.ro
https://feeds.marinsoftware.com/~/t/0/0/marininsights/~/https:/antena24.ro
https://www.bing.com/news/apiclick.aspx?ref=FexRss&aid=&tid=60610D15439B4103A0BF4E1051EDCF8B&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F&c=12807976268214810202&mkt=en-us
https://maps.google.bj/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://www.google.bj/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://www.htcdev.com/?URL=antena24.ro
https://maps.google.mu/url?q=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://mitsui-shopping-park.com/lalaport/ebina/redirect.html?url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://images.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://maps.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://google.co.uk/url?sa=t&url=https%3A%2F%2Fantena24.ro%2F
https://results.dogpile.com/search/web?q=antena24.ro
https://www.ask.com/web?q=antena24.ro
https://search.aol.com/aol/search?s_chn=prt_bon&q=antena24.ro
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=antena24.ro&ia=web
https://www.bing.com/search?q=antena24.ro
https://search.yahoo.com/search?p=antena24.ro
https://search.yahoo.co.jp/search?p=antena24.ro1 -
Does an external link to an image file on my site help my SEO?
I found a few websites that are displaying images from my site. Curiously, they have also linked these images to the source image file on my website. I found these because Moz showed these sites in my list of backlinks. I assume that means it impacts my Domain Authority. But does this actually help me in search engines since it's not linking to a page on my site?
Link Building | | AlexLenhoff0 -
Sudden drop in external links... why?
We had a lot of external links (2.5K, which was good compared to our competition), but in the last few weeks, it dropped 1.1K. I obviously did something wrong. What are the causes of such a dramatic drop like that? Questions, suggestions, ideas, anything is welcome at this point. Thanks!
Link Building | | brandon_lee0 -
A link with "return false"- OSE sees as a No Followed Link
Hello, I couldn't find a clear answer to the impact on SEO for a link written in this way: [" class="expert_info" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">](w</span>ww.yourwebsite.com<span style=) [Does the "return false" act as a "no follow"? I came across this in our link data in Open Site Explorer which lists these links all as "no follows." However, an engineer I spoke to said that it shouldn't impact search engine behavior. Any ideas? Thank you in advance! -Sarah K.](w</span>ww.yourwebsite.com<span style=)
Link Building | | OneMedical0 -
Linking to sites that link to porn or casinos, my site getting penalized?
I have some link exchanges with some sites to get web traffic but when i ran the bad neighborhood link checker, i found that one site links to some casinos and another site has one link to a porn site. Is this getting me penalized? should i remove the links to these sites? Thanks, Ron
Link Building | | Ron100 -
Outgoing links - internal vs. external
I thought that the important factor in the value of a link was how many outing links a page has total. Some tools seems to tell me that the important data point is how many EXTERNAL links a page has. Which number should I be paying attention to when looking at pages I want to get linked from? (Yes, I know there are many other factors that are important)
Link Building | | EugeneF0 -
Backlink booster - boosts and helps to index links?
Hello all, We are using a tool called backlink booster that works in the following way: you view a page with a backlink to your site click on a boost link saved in favourites the link is pinged to rss directories and web 2.0 sites The idea is to get your links indexed faster. Has anyone used this or something like this and had any benefit from it? Thanks Shehzad.
Link Building | | Gareth_Cartman0 -
Porn link ...
I just ran https://www.majesticseo.com report for back links and showed me that I have one link at porn site ... not sure if it will be appropriate to post it here. The link was discovered on 03.05.11 and when I visited today link is not there... I dont know who put that link there. Can I get penalty for that from google? Can it be a mistake?
Link Building | | DiamondJewelryEmpire1