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.
Linking domains vs Inbound Links
-
Hello,
Whats the diference between Linking domains and Inbound links in Open Site Explorer?
And also with is most important to analyze?
Tks in advance!
Pedro Pereira
-
As many as you can get.
Stay consistent. Keep a schedule and build up your links over time. Don't rely too heavily on directory links. Remember that the harder a link is to get, the more valuable it usually is.
-
As always is a privilage to be in here in SEOmoz forum. This is like taking classes and learning from the best. Tks guys! It really helped!
One last Question Cyrus. How many links would you recomend to link to my site since it doesnt have many yet (www.digitaldiscovery.com.pt) using the SEOmoz tool of directorys?
-
Casey got the definition of inbound links vs. # of linking domains right, so let me just add a couple of points.
If you look at correlation ranking factors, the number of linking root domains correlates higher to good rankings than the number of raw links. As our friend at Seattle Organic pointed out, it's much better to have 100 linking domains than 100 links from one site.
I wouldn't worry so much about the 1:1 ratio. That's a situation that will take care of itself as you build links.
Best of luck with your SEO!
-
Also, just fyi Pedro, but I think domains is more important of a metric in general from all the work I've done. Each domain is a unique website and most likely a better vote than 100 links from the same website. These days there are footer links or sidebar links in a lot of Content Management Systems (cms's) and they replicate multiple links from multiple blog posts or pages on the site. So, you may seen 1000+ links from one website. However, in my humble opinion and from what I've seen over many websites, google is counting the domains you're getting links from more than they are all the different links from the individual domains.
For example, let's equate links to fans. If you had 100 fans, but one of those fans gave you 100 complements, how would an outsider take each of those complements. I would argue the outsider (i.e., Google) would give credit to the one fan & not necessarily the 99 extra complements. While it's great to see all the 100 complements from an outsider's perspective, most likely that outsider would give you credit for just the one fan complementing you. Does that make sense?
-
Right, personally I have never seen a aged website with the same linking domains as inbound links.
I am not saying its bad, I just havent seen it and wouldn't recommend that because of that observation. Dont go crazy over it as obviously you cant get multiple links from every source you find.
-
Hi Casey,
Tks for the aswer. One last question thow. Your saying to not keep doing link-building with 1:1 ratio. Does that makes Google wondering?
Tks in advance,
Pedro M Pereira
-
Linking domains is the total number of domains linking back to you.
Inbound links is the total number or links you actually have. Each domain could be linking to you from different pages on their site, adding up to the total "inbound links".
I think its important to have both. You obviously dont want 1 domain bringing you 1,000 inbound links. If you build up your linking domains, total inbound links will naturally rise. Just dont keep it at a 1:1 ratio
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
-
Redirecting one domain to another using utm tags
I have two live websites, which have both been live for over 10 years, so we have plenty of backlinks to both...domain1.com & domain2.com. Domain 1 and all urls is being merged into domain2.com. So 301 redirects will be setup for every page of the site....domain1.com/abc-1234/ to > domain2.com/abc-1234/ In Google analytics for domain2.com we want to be able to see which visits we have received as a result of a redirect from domain1.com. It is possible to see these visits that come in via organic, referrals and social etc, as those will come to us with the referral as domain1.com. However, with direct traffic, i.e. if someone types domain1.com into their search bar, these visits will be assigned as direct and we are not able to tell in GA if those users have typed in domain2.com, or domain1.com to get to our webpage. There are some suggestions in forums of adding utm_source tracking to all redirects (and add canonicals to those urls pointing to the non utm_source version), but my concern is that Google is going to have to go through one extra step to reach the page on the redirected domain. So without the utm source code Google will follow this route
Reporting & Analytics | | Sayers
domain1.com/123/ to domain2.com/123/ With the utm source code Google will follow this route
domain.com/123/ to domain2.com/123/?utm_source... then see's canonical, so moves to domain2.com/123/ So essentially I am giving Google one extra step to follow before it gets to the equivalent page on the new site. Is this an issue, and/or are there any other ways to track this redirection without adding extra parameters to the url?0 -
Difference between External Followed Links and Total External Links?
Hello, could someone please elaborate on what is meant by "External Followed Links" vs. "Total External Links"? Does "External Followed Links" mean the number of links that are generating traffic to the site? Or is there some other way to conceptualize it? Any help would be appreciated! Thank you in advance.
Reporting & Analytics | | lincolndigitalgroup1 -
Referral Traffic vs. Campaign Traffic in Google Analytics
I have two sites: a blog and an ecommerce site. The blog funnels people to the ecommerce site. In Analytics I'm seeing declines in referral traffic from the blog to the ecommerce site. During the same time I'm seeing an increase in campaign traffic to the ecommerce site, with most campaign traffic coming from the blog. I believe the increase in campaign traffic is largely a result of simply having installed more tracking links. This leads me to believe that the declines I'm seeing in referral traffic is simply a result of the increase in campaign traffic. In other words, what was once counted and reported as being referral traffic is now being counted and reported as campaign traffic. So my question is this: In Google Analytics is campaign traffic ALSO reported as referral traffic, or is campaign traffic reported separately and not duplicated in referral traffic reports? I'll provide a concrete example to make this more clear in case it isn't: Say site X sends 1000 visits each month to site Y. Say 50 of those visits come from a single link on X. If that link is changed so that campaign Z data info added (via the Google URL Builder), would you expect to then see 950 referral visits each month from site X to site Y plus 50 campaign visits to site Y via new campaign Z, or would you continue to see 1000 referral visits plus the new 50 campaign visits? Many thanks in advance to anyone that can shed some light on this.
Reporting & Analytics | | aaronprimal0 -
Does traffic coming from Adwords increase overall Domain Authority or Page Rank?
If I'm setting up an Adwords campaign, will setting my homepage as the landing page boost my domain rank? and will the Page Rank of the landing page get boosted because of the high click rate coming from the Adwords campaign?
Reporting & Analytics | | s2bkevin0 -
Google Analytics VS target="_blank" internal links: How much wrong is it?
I am working on an e-commerce website, and our CEO is sure that having target="_blank" in internal search result is boosting the conversion (not sure, but it's not an issue at the moment). The problem is that Google Analytics sees all URLs visited from search results as entrances/direct visits, hence the Booking Funnel Tracking does not work as it was supposed to. Is there any way to recover the tracking? Or we shall get the rid of target="_blank" attribute?
Reporting & Analytics | | apartmentGin0 -
Should you get a new Google Analytics account if your site has a new domain after a site redesign/new development?
We recently developed a new site for a client and they have opted to move forward with a domain change. Should we create a new Google Analytics account for the new site?
Reporting & Analytics | | TheOceanAgency0 -
Email campaigns. Should I link to my blog or to my site?
I have a client for who we write and post a daily blog article. The articles are optimized and linked to particular targeted content on his top level site. Now we are going to start e-marketing to his 3000+ website users to announce inventory changes and specials. My question is (from a SE standpoint) are we better off linking the e-mail content to the blog and introducing people to the blog (but adding an additional step for getting to the new inventory. Or are we better off putting a link in the HTML E-mail letter that we send out to both the blog and separately to the inventory section? Just to clarify, we wonder if the search engines would provide some additional authority for the extra blog traffic and thereby build the overall score of the blog & site. We are looking at the e-mail campaigns as a potential opportunity to impact SE scores not just awareness of new inventory. Thanks everyone!
Reporting & Analytics | | webindustry0 -
Google Analytics: how many visits from country Google domains?
Hello, I manage a site with visitors from many different countries. With Google Analytics, it is normal to see the number of visitors from each search engine. However, I would like to identify the number of visitors from each Google-search contry domain. How many visitors from Google.com? How many from Google.co.uk. And from Google.co.zm? And so on. Anybody knows if this is possible and if yes, how can it be done? Thank you in advance, Dario
Reporting & Analytics | | Darioz0