Why don't directory backlinks show up in Open Link Explorer?
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Why don't we see linking root domains like yelp, google, yahoo, etc? Is there any way to get a more accurate list of links to a domain where webmaster tools are not an option?
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Thanks Everybody for the quick and thoughtful responses. I'm sure I'll find the data I'm looking for with the suggested tools.
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Hi Scott,
Sadly, we don't have quite the server farms and processing power and PhDs that Google and Bing have to throw at this, so we don't have as robust an index. For sites that you can't verify in Google Webmaster Tools, don't forget to check out Bing. They announced at SMX Advanced in June of 2012 that they're again offering up a ton of link data for even non-verified sites.
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SEO SpyGlass is not a half-bad additional link tool to check out as well. SpyGlass is slower and will not pull data instantaneously like Majestic or OSE. However, what I like about SpyGlass over the other tools is it will actually visit the sites and see if the links still exists, which is why it takes so long to get all the data together.
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Open Site Explorer actually has quite a limited crawl. We don't find it unusual for OSE to report under 5% of the links that something like Majestic reports. However it does try to target the top end, so you don't end up wading through page upon page of dross.
You should also be aware that it isn't updated as often as some of the other tools. That can mean that newer links don't appear.
OSE is good for finding a picture of the links that are likely to actually be helping in rankings. If you want a full and fresh set then it probably isn't the best tool, but you might find that "full and fresh" isn't always the most useful.
As broadbeach says, Ahrefs or Majestic would be good options (I love ahrefs at the moment). Raven just uses data from OSE and majestic, so there are no new sources in that, although it is a great tool for many other reasons.
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Hi Scott,
If you believe that Open Site Explorer doesn't show every single link (which may well happen), you can always double check a website by using the following tools:
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Majestic SEO (very very good)
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Ahrefs
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Raven Tools
I believe the best one is still the link report you can find in Google Webmaster Tools (with Majestic SEO second), but as you say, that is not always an option.
Best of luck.
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