Backlinks vs Incoming links
-
Hi,
I've been getting stuck into some SEO analysis for a company I work for and I am a little confused. I've tried a search to get an answer but this has ended up being more confusing. The company has been around for decades and their website since 1996.
I read everywhere about 'backlinks'. My SEO toolbar shows ZERO backlinks in Google but 218 in Bing. Google Webmaster tools shows nearly 2,000 incoming links from other sites.
Is a backlink the same as an incoming link? Why is this tool showing zero? I am even getting email from SEO spammers saying my backlink count is ZERO. But I can see links everywhere I look to the site.
Also, on the link analysis tool with SEOMOZ a competitor is showing 3000 external showing links with 250,000 total links. My site is showing 50 and 470 respectively.
I have spent the best part of two years getting the site listed in industry related directories. We have paid for entries in Yahoo and some other high (PR) -ranking directories. Prior to me there was someone else adding the site to directories and getting incoming links from industry related sites. So this has been going on a while.
Why are the backlings showing as zero but links from external sites showing over 1800?
Thanks
TT
-
I'll only chime in on Google: they don't like to show you everything. Across their products, they (at best) give you only a sampling, so even if numbers appear low that's not necessarily an indication it's true. The data I get from Analytics often is not the same as what feeds into Omniture; my takeaway is that these are indicators, not facts, to work with and make intuitive decisions.
Some of the other responders mentioned some other tools/options - variety is always good as, quite frankly - not one tool is perfect. You're on the right track and are doing your due diligence and that's what matters the most.
-
Doing a link: search in Google will only show you a very small number (sometimes none of the links) that Google has indexed. Use Google Webmaster Tools to see all (or at least most of ) the links that Google has indexed for your site.
Don't worry - Google still counts the links that they don't show for a link: search.
Bottom line: ignore the results you see from doing a link: search - they are too incomplete and don't matter.
-
Thanks for the response.
If Webmaster tools is showing over 1800 incoming links, Alexa is showing over 200 and I can verify many solid links myself from top directories such as Yahoo business directory then why is Google showing none?
What do I need to check or do?
My concern is if Google is showing no backlinks (and if I use link:www.domain.com in Google I get no results) then this will affect the PR and the position in SERPS.
-
There's only 3 categories of links
- Links pointing to your site. These are "incoming" and are sometimes called "backlinks" since they "link back" to your site.
- Links from your site to another site. These are "outbound" (sometimes you'll see the acronym OBL for "outbound link")
- Links within your site (between pages of the same domain). These are most commonly called "internal"
As Adam said, no search engine shows all your links (except maybe Yahoo). Open Site Explorer and Linkscape are a much more complete picture because Roger (the SEOMOZ bot) is crawling the web and indexing them. Better still is that SEOMOZ ranks them on importance. Honestly, it's one of the best things about the SEOMOZ PRO service.
-
"incoming link" is not as common of a term to use, but it does mean the same thing as backlink.
Google search and Bing search will not show you all your backlinks - just a selection.
Google Webmaster Tools is the most complete and accurate data you can get on how many backlinks you have. Open Site Explorer (SEOmoz) is also very helpful, as it helps you analyze your backlinks.
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
-
Moz reports way fewer backlinks than google search?
My site is only 11 months old but has steadily (if not slowly) been gaining backlinks. My question, is why Moz shows me at 303 backlinks and Google search console is showing at 1,237? I am more than a little suspicious that this could highlight the reason Moz shows such an unfavorable DA ranking for our site at a DA12. Other competitors that rank for similar keywords to mine are DA 42, DA 65, DA 73, etc. If the largest ranking factor is links, and they have mine reported incorrectly - is this the issue with DA as it relates to sites like mine? Any answer from someone who has experienced similar, or has a definitive answer is more than welcome to chime in! Thanks, Kevin
Reporting & Analytics | | kvncrll0 -
Search Console Linking
Hey everyone! Quick question; there have been problems in the past with some of our accounts' Search Console integration becoming unlinked from Google Analytics without us knowing about it. I did some digging into Google Analytics to see if there was a way to create an alert for search queries dropping off, but there doesn't seem to be any options for Search Console alerts like there are for other integrations like Google Ads. Has anyone discovered a way to have an alert or some type of notification set up for when a Search Console integration is unlinked in Google Analytics or if search queries drop off significantly? I'd appreciate the help!
Reporting & Analytics | | ReunionMarketing0 -
Buffer Link and Google Impressions
Afternoon, I noticed a spike in impressions over a couple of days in April, so I investigated Analytics to see where these were coming from. It appears these impressions were split between two URLs; one was a blog post, the other was the Buffer link to the blog post that we used on Twitter and Facebook. According to Analytics, this Buffer URL received 1000 impressions over two days, with an average SERP position of 16. This surely can't be right, can it? Is this just another Analytics quirk? After two days of a decent amount of impressions to this Buffer link, the amount of impressions dropped to pretty much zero. I know Tweets are now starting to rank, but this would be the Twitter URL, not the Buffer link to our blog post? Any ideas, Cheers, Lewis
Reporting & Analytics | | PeaSoupDigital0 -
Ecommerce site product link. How to handle a link that doesn't exist.
Suppose we have this product A, and we just have a single item for this. When the item is sold out we do not want to show it on the website saying "out of stock". Instead we would like to remove the product from out store which will now result in a url that doesn't exist. And google webmaster tool and Moz analytic will show them as page not found after they crawl over the site. Should i be generating a new sitemap.xml and update ? How do i handle those pages that don't exist anymore ? Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | MindlessWizard0 -
Lost rankings after disavowing links
About two months ago, I received an unnatural inbound links message from Google. Then I disavowed 58 (the worst ones) and now I can see that right after the date I submitted my disavow file I'm losing rankings. What would you suggest? I don't really want to revoke my disavow file because it has totally bad links. I have this idea to build 58 links from high quality sites (instead of the 58 I disavowed). Do you think it'll work faster (if at all) or I just need to remove my disavow file?
Reporting & Analytics | | VinceWicks0 -
An initial set up question - linking to GA
when viewing campaign it indicates there is a problem linking to our GA account but the details entered are correct. Any ideas what the problem might be - nothing on the campaign settings page gives me a clue. There is a highlighted box saying disconnect from GA but nothing else. The only thing i can think of is that the GA account was set up by a third party and we have access to view it - could it be a permissions problem?
Reporting & Analytics | | GreatGifts4Kids0 -
On what report do I get to know where do the external links come from?
I need to get a list of the external links. I don't find that report, where do I get it?
Reporting & Analytics | | carloscontinua0 -
Problem when searching for "link:www.mysite.com" vs "link: www.mysite.com"
Why does a search for "link:www.mysite.com" show no results, but when there is a space before www.mysite.com it shows results? The same happens for "link:www.mysite.com" (nothing shows up), but when I search for "link:www.mysite.com/index.php" it returns results. Is there a problem I am missing? Thanks so much!
Reporting & Analytics | | EmilyP0