Skip to content
    Moz logo Menu open Menu close
    • Products
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Pro Home
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Home
      • STAT
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Home
      • Compare SEO Products
      • Moz Data
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis
      • Keyword Explorer
      • Link Explorer
      • Competitive Research
      • MozBar
      • More Free SEO Tools
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO
      • SEO Learning Center
      • Moz Academy
      • MozCon
      • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers
      • Agency Solutions
      • Enterprise Solutions
      • Small Business Solutions
      • The Moz Story
      • New Releases
    • Log in
    • Log out
    • Products
      • Moz Pro

        Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

      • Moz Local

        Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

      • STAT

        SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

      • Moz API

        Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

      • Compare SEO Products

        See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

      • Moz Data

        Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research
      Moz Pro

      Track AI Overviews in Keyword Research

      Try it free!
    • Free SEO Tools
      • Domain Analysis

        Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

      • Keyword Explorer

        Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

      • Link Explorer

        Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

      • Competitive Research

        Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

      • MozBar

        See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

      • More Free SEO Tools

        Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
      Moz Pro

      NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

      Learn more
    • Learn SEO
      • Beginner's Guide to SEO

        The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

      • SEO Learning Center

        Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

      • On-Demand Webinars

        Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

      • How-To Guides

        Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

      • Moz Academy

        Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

      • MozCon

        Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
      Moz API

      Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

      Find your plan
    • Blog
    • Why Moz
      • Digital Marketers

        Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

      • Small Business Solutions

        Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

      • Agency Solutions

        Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

      • Enterprise Solutions

        Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

      • The Moz Story

        Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

      • New Releases

        Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

      Surface actionable competitive intel
      New Feature

      Surface actionable competitive intel

      Learn More
    • Log in
      • Moz Pro
      • Moz Local
      • Moz Local Dashboard
      • Moz API
      • Moz API Dashboard
      • Moz Academy
    • Avatar
      • Moz Home
      • Notifications
      • Account & Billing
      • Manage Users
      • Community Profile
      • My Q&A
      • My Videos
      • Log Out

    The Moz Q&A Forum

    • Forum
    • Questions
    • Users
    • Ask the Community

    Welcome to the Q&A Forum

    Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

    1. Home
    2. SEO Tactics
    3. Technical SEO
    4. Do Backlinks to a PDF help with overall authority/link juice for the rest of the domain?

    Moz Q&A is closed.

    After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

    Do Backlinks to a PDF help with overall authority/link juice for the rest of the domain?

    Technical SEO
    4
    4
    4261
    Loading More Posts
    • Oldest to Newest
    • Newest to Oldest
    • Most Votes
    Reply
    • Reply as question
    Log in to reply
    This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
    • MattAaron
      MattAaron last edited by

      We are working on a website that has some high-quality industry articles available on their website.

      For each article, there is an abstract with a link to the PDF which is hosted on the domain.

      We have found in Analytics that a lot of sites link directly to the PDF and not the webpage that has the abstract of the article.

      Can we get any benefit from a direct PDF link? Or do we need to modify our strategy?

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • RobMay
        RobMay last edited by

        You can/need to build links from within the domain to thePDF report you want to share also. Links within the PFD file will also help for people who share the file via email, and not within the site. This will bring people back to your domain.

        1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
        • firstconversion
          firstconversion last edited by

          Also have a Google for optimising pdfs for search, i know there are number of ways & options

          http://www.seomoz.org/ugc/how-to-optimize-pdf-documents-for-search

          http://searchengineland.com/eleven-tips-for-optimizing-pdfs-for-search-engines-12156

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
          • EGOL
            EGOL last edited by

            Add links to your site within the .pdf

            You can also add your branding to the .pdf

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 1
            • 1 / 1
            • First post
              Last post

            Got a burning SEO question?

            Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


            Start my free trial


            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.

            • See all categories

            Related Questions

            • acsilver

              What do you do with product pages that are no longer used ? Delete/redirect to category/404 etc

              We have a store with thousands of active items and thousands of sold items. Each product is unique so only one of each. All products are pinned and pushed online ... and then they sell and we have a product page for a sold item. All products are keyword researched and often can rank well for longtail keywords Would you :- 1. delete the page and let it 404 (we will get thousands) 2. See if the page has a decent PA, incoming links and traffic and if so redirect to a RELEVANT category page ? ~(again there will be thousands) 3. Re use the page for another product - for example a sold ruby ring gets replaces with ta new ruby ring and we use that same page /url for the new item. Gemma

              Technical SEO | | acsilver
              0
            • bill369

              Do Canonical Tags Pass Link Juice?

              I have an ecommerce website where some pages link to a product page with a different URL. EXAMPLE: 1: /category/product1.html (not indexed by Google) with canonical pointing to product1.html Other page link to the product like below. 2: product1.html (indexed by Google) Now the question is, does 1: pass any link juice to product1.html or not? Is it worth to change everything and link only to one URL? My site is running on Magento!

              Technical SEO | | bill369
              0
            • arun.negi

              We switched the domain from www.blog.domain.com to domain.com/blog.

              We switched the domain from www.blog.domain.com to domain.com/blog. This was done with the purpose of gaining backlinks to our main website as well along with to our blog. This set us very low in organic traffic and not to mention, lost the backlinks. For anything, they are being redirected to 301 code. Kindly suggest changes to bring back all the traffic.

              Technical SEO | | arun.negi
              0
            • PioneerServices

              Can you have a /sitemap.xml and /sitemap.html on the same site?

              Thanks in advance for any responses; we really appreciate the expertise of the SEOmoz community! My question: Since the file extensions are different, can a site have both a /sitemap.xml and /sitemap.html both siting at the root domain? For example, we've already put the html sitemap in place here: https://www.pioneermilitaryloans.com/sitemap Now, we're considering adding an XML sitemap. I know standard practice is to load it at the root (www.example.com/sitemap.xml), but am wondering if this will cause conflicts. I've been unable to find this topic addressed anywhere, or any real-life examples of sites currently doing this. What do you think?

              Technical SEO | | PioneerServices
              0
            • Grumpy_Carl

              Domain authority and keyword difficulty

              I know there are too many variables for a certain answer, however do people take their domain authority into account when using keyword difficulty tool? I have a new domain which only has a score of seven at the moment.  When using the keyword searching tool what is the maximum difficulty level keywords people would target initially? Obviously I would seek to increase the difficulty of the words over time but to start off its a hard choice between keywords which can be ranked for in a reasonable period of time and the keywords which are getting enough traffic to make the effort worthwhile.

              Technical SEO | | Grumpy_Carl
              0
            • AndreVanKets

              Will errors on a subdomain effect the overall health of the root domain?

              As stated in the question, we have 2 sub domains that contain over 2000 reported errors from SEOMOZ. The root domain has a clean bill of health, and i was just wondering if these errors on the sub-domains could have a negative effect on the root domain in the eyes of Google. Your comments will be appreciated. Regards Greg

              Technical SEO | | AndreVanKets
              0
            • glennfriesen

              Does the Referral Traffic from a Link Influence the SEO Value of that Link?

              If a link exists, and nobody clicks on it, could it still be valuable for SEO? Say I have 1000 links on 500 sites with Domain Authority ranging from 35 to 80. Let's pretend that 900 of those links generate referral traffic. Let's assume that the remaining 100 links are spread between 10 domains of the 500, but nobody ever clicks on them. Are they still valuable? Should an SEO seek to earn more links like those, even though they don't earn referral traffic? Does Google take referral data into account in evaluating links? 5343313-zelda-rogers-albums-zelda-pictures-duh-what-else-would-they-be-picture3672t-link-looks-so-lonely.jpg Sad%20little%20link.jpg

              Technical SEO | | glennfriesen
              1
            • Weerdboil

              Delete old site but redirect domain to a new domain and site

              I just have a quick query and I have a feeling about what the answer is so just wanted to see what you guys thought... Basically I am working on a client site. This client has a few other websites that are divisions of their company. However these divisions/websites are no longer used. They are wanting to delete the websites but redirect the domains to their name main website. They believe this will pass on SEO benefits as these old division sites are old and have a good PR and history. I'm unsure for DEFINITE, which way is correct?

              Technical SEO | | Weerdboil
              0

            Get started with Moz Pro!

            Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

            Start my free trial
            Products
            • Moz Pro
            • Moz Local
            • Moz API
            • Moz Data
            • STAT
            • Product Updates
            Moz Solutions
            • SMB Solutions
            • Agency Solutions
            • Enterprise Solutions
            • Digital Marketers
            Free SEO Tools
            • Domain Authority Checker
            • Link Explorer
            • Keyword Explorer
            • Competitive Research
            • Brand Authority Checker
            • Local Citation Checker
            • MozBar Extension
            • MozCast
            Resources
            • Blog
            • SEO Learning Center
            • Help Hub
            • Beginner's Guide to SEO
            • How-to Guides
            • Moz Academy
            • API Docs
            About Moz
            • About
            • Team
            • Careers
            • Contact
            Why Moz
            • Case Studies
            • Testimonials
            Get Involved
            • Become an Affiliate
            • MozCon
            • Webinars
            • Practical Marketer Series
            • MozPod
            Connect with us

            Contact the Help team

            Join our newsletter
            Moz logo
            © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
            • Accessibility
            • Terms of Use
            • Privacy

            Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.