12 replies to this topic

[bobmeetin]

Some long time back I read that google's link:www.mysite.com was lacking in accuracy and it was recommended to do something like:

www.mysite.com -site:www.mysite.com

On my site I have some pages which are getting indexed regularly and they have designs/layouts, including some text and links to the live sites. They have been around for some time. Well, you guessed it, the above code does not produce results. I have also gone to google and entered the likes of:

www.site1.com www.site2.com

with the knowledge that both are listed on the same layouts page. My knowledge seems to be falling short. Is there a better, more accurate way to be checking links these days?

-B

[Jill]

www.mysite.com -site:www.mysite.com

Yeah, that's no good either.

Checking your backward links in Yahoo generally shows who's linking to you.

Or Google's Webmaster Tools seems to provide more info as well.

[bobmeetin]

Google webmaster tools seems to do the trick. I don't remember how, where I found the other method, www.mysite-com -site:www.mysite.com, but I will put it to rest.

However the proverbial WHY question resurfaces:

I have a page on my site which includes images and URL's to live sites I have designed. This designs page is getting regularly indexed, I checked cache and it is very recent, within the week.

www.site1.com www.site2.com are two examples of sites that are on the page with links to each. IMHM (in my humble mind) I should be able to go to google, yahoo, etc and enter:

www.site1.com www.site2.com

Whether the search input is two website URL's or some regular key phrases then it should result in finding the page. Google returns a frowny face. Any idea why?

-Bob

[Jill]

If the URL is just in an <a href> link and not the anchor text visibly in the content of your page, then what you're seeing sounds normal to me.

When you say you're searching for regular key phrases, do you mean words that are on the page you have the link?

[bobmeetin]

Well well well then you got me here. I pretty-icized the links to not display the URL in the visible text. That pretty much answers the question, very easy to fix. Basically what you're saying is that because the link was not displaying as regular text that google or other were ignoring ignoring it, i.e. not seeing it as a 'key phrase'. Case closed... -B

[Randy]

I'm confused I think.

Wouldn't you want the keyword phrase in your anchor text? It sounds like that's what you already had.

The search you were doing however is not going to return what you seem to think it would, because the url address for www.site2.com is not part of the visible text of the page.

If the page in question is cached and if the linking text shows in the cache, it's about a sure as you can get that the link is counting towards the other site.

[Jill]

Yeah I'm confused to. Your last post isn't making any sense to me, and quite frankly, I'm now confused as to what you were even originally asking.

Are you trying to check a backward link or something else?

[bobmeetin]

Perhaps it's live example time:

Text before this thread:

<span class="whatever">
<a href='http://www.site1.com' target="_new">Visible text for demo layout site #1</a>
</span>

<span class="whatever">
<a href='http://www.site1.com' target="_new">Visible text for demo layout site #2</a>
</span>

Proposed change to get the url to show up as well:

<span class="whatever">
<a href='http://www.site1.com' target="_new">www.site1.com - New anchor text includes the URL</a>
</span>

<span class="whatever">
<a href='http://www.site1.com' target="_new">www.site1.com - New anchor text includes the URL</a>
</span>

The sub-problem:

I had it in my mind that if I google the two sites as the key phrase: www.site1.com www.site2.com that this search should bring you to the layouts page on my site, however google returns 0 results. So it sounds like you confirmed that the search engine is only indexing the anchor text as in the proposed change which includes the URL?

This is a different problem than checking linking which google's webmaster tools solves.

[Jill]

One question. Why do you care if the site shows up when you type the URL into Google?

[bobmeetin]

Solving the right problem is the key, but only if you're asking the right question. I may have confused the two issues.

Before I checked the links with Google webmaster tools, I was using the other method (not working), www.mysite.com -site:www.mysite.com. The results were horribly inconsistent.

In my humble mind, if I go to any search engine and the content I am searching for is indexed, I should be able to enter an appropriate search phrase, such as www.mysite.com, and find the page, but since it was link, not anchor, it does not work that way, I got that.

I guess this is not really so important, it just seems to give a warm/fuzzy if I can enter the URL, not just the anchor text, and get the expected results. It would be a simple way of showing a client that it works without having to go to the webmaster tools. But no it is not necessary. I am happy. Perhaps I should write a eulogy on this thread?

[End2ENd]

I read the entire thread.
Even Im confused now.

Just a question which was a consequence of reading this thread.

If there is a website which has a picture (Logo) on his website linking to my website, would SEs crawl through it?

Is it necessary to have text links to get linking benefit??

Thanks in anticipation.

[don h]

If there is a website which has a picture (Logo) on his website linking to my website, would SEs crawl through it?

Is it necessary to have text links to get linking benefit??

#1 Yes, as long as the link isn't nofollowed

#2: Image links give benefit, use the alt tag to give the SE the text.

[End2ENd]

#1 Yes, as long as the link isn't nofollowed

#2: Image links give benefit, use the alt tag to give the SE the text.

Thanks a lot Don.