279 replies to this topic

[Michael Martinez]

Internal links are definitely good, but you want external links, and many of us feel it's preferable to link to the folder name for index pages rather than to the index page name. You get shorter URLs that way and if you ever change your file system (like from .htm to to .php) you don't have to worry about changing all the URLs.

[justicewhite]

G tells me I have 89 IBLs for my site (appleton-estates*com) but only show up to 21 of them.

I know that Google has reported a problem with the site: command and the domains with dash in them but I haven't heard anything about the link: command. Any comments?

[torka]

The link command has been broken for something just short of forever (at least a year or two). That's probably why you're not hearing anything about it now -- it's being broken isn't "news" anymore. The problems with the site: command are much more recent.

HTH!

--Torka

[YaoPau]

Since my first attempt at optimizing my website, it has become a insurmountable behemoth on MSN searches, yet remains all-but-invisible on Google and Yahoo. Flabbergasted, I ran a quick "links:__________" check on my site and found that only MSN located my two best links.

Does this mean Google and Yahoo aren't factoring these links in? Why does Google only post a couple of links while Yahoo posts a bunch? Is there a chance that these links will be factored in in the future, thereby causing my rankings to skyrocket? Oh God I hope so.

[torka]

Google's link: command is "broken" and has been for well over a year, maybe two.

Well, okay, it may not be broken in the sense that it does, in fact, do what they intend for it to do, but it is broken in the sense that it doesn't do what any reasonable person outside the Googleplex would expect it to do (i.e. display the links that Google knows about for a given page). Rather, it only shows a random selection of the links they know about, and usually a pretty small sample at that.

(Not to mention that just because they know about a link, this doesn't necessarily mean they "count" that link for anything, so even if link: did work the way one expected, it still wouldn't necessarily give one any useful information...)

--Torka

[redsonia!]

Mods: We get asked this question so frequently, do you think we could add this info to the [url=http://www.highrankings.com/forum/index.php/topic/833-tips-for-new-seos/]Tips for Newbies[/url] thread?

[chrishirst]

well if you look in the [url=http://www.highrankings.com/forum/index.php?showforum=10]link building forum[/url] you will find this thread.

http://www.highranki...showtopic=17793

[qwerty]

Flabbergasted, I ran a quick "links:__________" check on my site and found that only MSN located my two best links.

That's probably a typo above, but just in case anyone is confused, the proper syntax is link: rather than links:

[Luca L.]

New back-links towards my website that are indexed by Google appear every day, but the number of links is not updated by Google at all, it remains constant and this has been going on for about 1 year now.
At <snipped url> which practically takes the Google’s query result “link:mysite” and compares it with the previous result, I can see every new links, each day there are 1-2 new links but still the number of indexed links is unchanged…it’s the same as a year ago.

Edited by Randy, 11 July 2006 - 12:33 PM.

[Michael Martinez]

Google only reports a random sampling of backlinks. Search for references to your URL to get the most accurate picture of what Google knows about who may be linking to your site.

But you'll find search engine optimization is much easier if you stop obsessing about backlinks, especially where Google is concerned. They have openly admitted to not valuing all links. You have no way of knowing for sure which links actually help you with Google.

[Rajesh]

Hi

Google page rank updated yes everyone know that ! but this some strange result is came out.I visited lots of site and found in the case of backlink those having good backlink in last update now they are got less backlink.Even in my site also no changes in the index page and the inner page has got less then.

Anyone has this type of experiences this time ......

[Randy]

Using the Google link: command is a waste of your time Rajesh. Even Google admit that it only shows a selection of links they know about.

And since they're not going to tell us what the selection criteria are ...

[nobsseo]

Google ranks by page. Not by site. So therefore, i have always thought, without thinking twice about it, that the "link:" operator, when used in Google to find out who is linking to you, will tell you which pages are linking to a single page of your site.

For example: i always took it that if you run "link:http://www.site.com" in Google (without the quotes ofcourse), Google will tell you which pages are linking to your home page--NOT which pages are linking to your home page PLUS other pages of your site.

However, i have emailed <company name removed as per guidelines OWG> and this is a reply i got from their support staff...

"If you use the "link:" operator on Google than Google will return web sites that link to the main page as well as web sites that link to sub pages."

You would think they would know since their software is built around the "link:" operator.

Does anyone have any light to shed on this matter?

Edited by OldWelshGuy, 20 July 2006 - 03:13 AM.

[OldWelshGuy]

The link: facility is not working as it should be anyhow, maybe this is why this company are like this.

[myronlo]

I have a quick question on the Google "link:" command. My site used to have many of its backlinks shown on Google using this command. The site has been around for 6+ years. Recently, I started noticing that everytime I used the Google "link:" command, Google would say that my "Search Did Not Match Any Documents".

Also, my website PR dropped from 6 to 4. I was wondering if these two issues were related? Does anyone know if this means that Google has invoked a penalty against my site?

Thanks in advance!