Root Domain and Subdomain Links OpenSite Explorer

[JoshBowers2012]

I'm using opensite explorer trying to explore who is linking to my clients site.

In the main blue area it shows total links as 20, which I understand is to the specific page.

In the Root Domain Metrics it shows 4,032 external links. Sub domain Metrics shows 1,973.

How do I find out where the links are? I tried creating a advanced link report with the "Links that to" are checked off as "any page on this root domain" and only shows 91 of the links?

What am I doing wrong or missing?

[JoshBowers2012]

Thanks everyone. Helped clear my head a bit on how to use the tool. The reason I was concerned was that the 4,000+ links were coming from 9 domains. Tracked it down to one, another site they own.... Just had to leave the project for a day and come back to it to think more clearly on how to find which site all the links were coming from and then how to show them all the links (and why it might not be a good idea to do that).

[DavidLee]

Hi Josh

When exporting a report or looking through the backlinks via paginating, OSE will only show you up to 25 links per linking domain so not all links will appear. I believe Majestic's and Ahrefs who are more backlink focuses has tools that may show more backlinks than we do.

Hope this helps!

[trung.ngo]

Hi Josh,

After inputting the URL you're researching, you can just click the blue "Export to CSV" link right below the dropdown filters on the "Inbound Links" tab (which is the default view after you search). A few quick tips:

• If you're looking to see only the external inbound links, which I suspect is the case here, you can select "Only External" from the second dropdown.
• The third dropdown gives you more options to see links to the exact URL you entered only, links to the subdomain of the URL you entered, or links to the root domain of the URL you entered.

Also note that the export is limited to 10,000 URLs. You can increase that to 100,000 by using an advanced report though. Hope that helps!

[crackingmedia]

Hi Josh

Without knowing the URL that you are specifically researching it's difficult to be sure, but I understand if you don't want to share that.

On the Open Site Explorer itself, what do you see if you click the Linking Domains tab?

If I put my site's domain in I see a list of the linking domains with a + symbol alongside each one. If I click that link, then it shows a link to each page on that linking domain that links to my site.

There is also a filter on this tab above the list of links which allows you to Shown Domains with links to: this page, pages on this sub-domain or pages on this root domain. Selecting on any of these and clicking the Filter button will show different pages of results.

I hope that helps,
Peter