Just a few screenshots of SEOmoz data before I move on to other topics:
Above is our inlinks list - almost 300,000. Yahoo! reports 458,349, and Google excludes results in supplemental, so we're seeing very similiar data from the two. The next example is a bit better for differentiating the two.
Above, Google's showing us all the links they know about to the blog post I wrote about my dad's emergency room visit a few weeks back. They've got 87 total listed to Yahoo!'s 76 (many of which are different than Google's). So, despite Google's "less-than-complete" link data, they're still supplying more than Yahoo! does sometimes and certainly showing some unique data. MSN shows 6 links (some of which neither Google nor Yahoo! listed).
Personally, I think I like Google's data the best at this point. In terms of raw numbers of links, it's the most compelling, as they have some limit on the quality or value of pages they'll display links from. While it's hard to get a competitive analysis from them, you can do a lot with those link numbers and I suspect we'll see a lot of analysis of dates and value as people start downloading and number-crunching the "up-to-1-million" links Google shows.
On to the other topics of the last week:
- On SEL today, Neil explained how the Digg friending system works and why the removal of the Top 100 list will remove some of those top users' power
- Last link from SEL (promise) - They showed off their January stats. I should show ours to help do a comparison. I'll probably do that at the end of February to compare the old version to this new incarnation.
- Barry noted that Live.com search still has a long way to go from a technology and relevance perspective. I'd have to agree.
- Andy Hagans wrote a truly robust guide to linkbaiting. I know everyone's linking to him, but it's well-deserved.
- Graywolf is doing a ton of stuff on local search this week, including an interview with our own Rebecca Kelley.
- What do you say Kirkland Googlers? Should we go over and check out the Terra Bite? I'll pick up the tab :)
- Guy Kawasaki tell us how he makes those nifty comic-style blog entries. Sadly, we can't reveal SEOmoz's secret formula. (I'm almost more excited for Rebecca's London comics than anything else we're doing there)
- Neil and Cameron from ACS have a new podcast on Webmaster Radio - congratulations!
- With his trademark chutzpah, Jim Boykin explains why he won't help new sites. While I sometimes feel the same way, SEOmoz has taken on a few new site clients and had great success. Of course, most of those have been Dugg a few times and Techcrunched once or twice, so that helps.
- Mind Valley shows us the value of proper capitalization. It's almost unbelievable what a difference it makes.
- I can't be the only one who loves the idea that clever viral marketing shut down a city. I do feel bad for Boston, but this kind of paranoia and news buzz has to be an amazing value for AQTHF.
- Pearsonified has been nominated for best designed blog of 2007. Congratulations, sir - it's well deserved.
- Google's President of Greater China, Dr. Kai-Fu Lee, spoke about some of Google's plans. Ian McAnerin covered them well last week.
- Joe Whyte wrote a fun piece on Google Filters and How to Get Around Them - I don't necessarily agree with everything here, but that almost makes it more interesting.
- The Eisenberg's relaunched their blog - Grokdotcom - a few nifty items there.
...and don't forget the pinch of salt from Matt Cutts on this feature...
"do not assume just because you see a backlink that it’s carrying weight."
We heard you the first two times Matt :)
The new link functionality rocks! It's too bad it's not public data though.
Google, please bring back the accurate link: command. Yahoo shows the data anyway, so it's not like your hiding something we cant get elsewhere.
agreed, Jarrod.
The new data is a mixed blessing. It's great to see almost everyone that is linking to you, but without no way to tell if they pull weight or not, I see a lot of new webmasters getting upset over this. "Wow, Google crawled every linkfarm I submitted to. I'm going to rock the results for Viagra!"
The un-crippled link: command is sorely missed. Although the new reports do make me feel a little better.
Ya,
The link builder in me is underwhelmed.
The site owner in me welcomes the new data. A lot of work still needs to be done but I'm liking Webmaster Central more each day.
Roadies,
Segmenting links by authority/quality sounds like a SEOMoz that needs to be developed! Rand???
I know we've looked at ways to the same at the agency I work for.
- Daniel
The PageStrength tool isn't too far off. If only we had access to the aggregate data like Compete or Alexa.
I'll be first to volunteer to download the new toolbar!
Suggestion for Google Webmaster Central:
Please give me the option to show me more than 100 links at at time and / or allow me to scroll through pages faster... when I get a sitewide link from X website and it takes 23 pages to see the next incoming links, I think its a little bit tough on the nerves and on the click / minute ratio.
Rand — While I certainly wish I'd already won "Best Designed Weblog," the contest isn't over yet! All I've been so far is nominated and voted into the final 5. Winners will be announced on March 12 at (where else?) SXSWi.
Don't even think about ditching my link, though :)
You're lucky you got here first Chris... because I was going to ask for a total link takedown. ;)
You'll have to excuse me here, but I'm going to be quite open about begging for a bit of help.
Does anyone know a way to track links to a directory level of a site, as opposed to the whole site or just a single page?
So, I can find how many links point at mysite.com or mysite.com/articles/story-about-stuff, but how can I find the number of links that point at the pages that make up the mysite.com/articles directory?
Any help would be much appreciated and will result in a 'virtual' hug or handshake depending on your preference...
Novicesque question: It seems I can only ascertain external links after site verification. Is that why people are calling for a working link: operator? When I do prelimenary analysis for sites, I like to use Yahoo! Site Explorer to gauge inbound links (along with SEOmoz Page Strength for a count), but I won't be able to do this with this Google tool unless I get access to the code, right?
Yeah, there is too much comptetitive information that you could gain otherwise. It would be nice to see the business intelligence that the sitemaps team has gathered on my competitor, but I realize that their needs to be checks and balances in such a competitive marketplace.
Thanks for posting about the google filters rand!!!
This is big. I was so glad when I logged in and saw all of that delicious linkage.
Does anyone know if it takes extra time for the links data to update? Two of my sites were crawled the last week of February, but no new links showed up. I know there have been some new links put up since the last time the site was crawled. Is the link data gathered separately from crawling, or does it take time to update?
I really can't see what's all the excitment about. Even now Google doesn't offer a full disclosure policy on backlinks and everyone is amazed...
And it's also great to finally find those links that are pointing to a non existing page on your website. I used to check Google Webmaster Tools for non existing pages and had to check Yahoo for what page linked to that page...
Great to see your data as always Rand!
I also think Eric Ward couldn't have said it better and loved the way he ended that post.
Let's just hope that Google will actually take all the advice on enhancements that they are sure to start hearing throughout the blogosphere including the few that Guillaume mentioned.
If they could Webmaster Central with mybloglog's features, and improve Google Analytics' reliability, and throw in Google Adwords keyword estimation tool, and put it all within a tabbed or some type of friendly user / software interface, they would have the killer package.
I don't know what's wrong with me but I've been missing words when I type sentences lately. Maybe I am becoming dumbed-down by over-usage of the internet!
I had to log in and check yesterday while reading Danny's post, just to make sure it was really true. An accurate link: command would be nice of course, but there's a lot more to like about Webmaster Central now than there was a few days ago.
I'm actually seeing more links from Google than from Yahoo, but the counts are close enough.
I had been thinking that being able to filter the results in a variety of ways would be a nice addition and I see Eric made all those suggestions. Good since Google is more likely to pay arrention to him than me.
No competitive analysis, but still some very good data that now goes past what we get from Yahoo at least for our sites.
Rand,
Where are you seeing official word that links to supplemental results are not being shown? I saw the same thing on SEL but I can find no official word that these links are being excluded.
I'd love to hear a clarification from Google on this.
How nice of you to offer lunch at the Terra Bite to the Google crew. Looks like a pretty rad place if you ask me. (Xbox and Food! Awright!) I hope the food is worth the price.
Tell you what, next time I'm in Seattle (SMX?), lunch is on me for the entire Moz gang. How does that sound? :)
Sounds delicious!
(I'm almost more excited for Rebecca's London comics than anything else we're doing there)
Thank God you bought Jeff that Apple Macbook, because the Comic Life program included on it will be way more time-efficient than plodding through the comic strips in Flash.
Comic Life looks like a lot of fun, I hope that wasn't the only part of the secret formula though, else Rand's going to be taking away Rebecca's blogging priveledges :)
Ohhh draggable comment windows, cool! This is my first comment on the new site and unfortunately it is about the new setup and now the blog post at hand.
Before I logged in Iwas only able to see a portion of the blog post, which is a good way to lead you in. However, you may want to have some sort of option in your CMS to all the sentence to finish or atleast the last word instead of a character cutoff. This is the last line that I saw when I started reading the intro of this post:
"Webmasters are going to find themselves with a lot more link anal..."
Now I'm not sure what link anal is...but I'm not sure it is a good thing. Being able to see an accurate link count, however, is good, so that is more on topic!
The link stuff gives for some cool analysis, for instance, Google is showing quite a few links for my sites that are nofollowed on that site. Though I know that it's supposed to mean "don't give weight to this link" (and YES Matt, we heard you), it feels weird :)
I've also found it to be a great resource of sites I hadn't found yet that were blatantly copying my feeds, time for some IP blocks and DMCA requests :)