Google Webmaster Tools not displaying all backlinks
-
I was asked to take a look at a site that a friend redesigned and immediately plummeted in rankings. It was a flash site where the domain redirected to a flash landing page. When the site was redesigned, they removed the flash page and put in the new site on the domain URL without changing the redirect or putting a 301 in place on the old flash landing page URL.
This site didn't have many backlinks to begin with, but it did ok for some important search phrases. Now when I look in Webmaster Tools, there are only 2 backlinks showing. Meanwhile I know there are more backlinks in existence, primarily from yellowpages and citysearch.
I've had them put a 301 on the old flash landing page pointing at the domain URL and they've added a canonical URL. What have I missed here?
-
Agreed, the point I was intending to make was that the WMT backlink info is not a definitive list, therefore it is not reliable resource of all backlinks.
I think it is a common mis-conception that because WMT is a Google product, the information in it must be 100% accurate, where as in reality that isn't the case.
Good point about the Majestic Fresh index, btw
-
A few thoughts - It can take a while for new links to be found by Google. They say it can take a couple of weeks but I've seen links that took months to be found.
Also, does the site have the proper www/non-www redirect in place? If Google thinks the www and non www are two different sites it's possible you're only getting the backlinks to one of those options.
-
Really? I often find that GWT reports a larger number of backlinks than the other tools. I agree that it takes time for the links to disappear once removed. this is where Majestic's fresh index can prove useful.
-
That sounds odd,
As William says, there isn't a tool out there that provides 100% of your backlinks. However, GWT is the most reliable source and usually provides more than any of the other tools (not surprising given Google's index).
I suspect there may be an issue with how it has been setup in GWT. I would go through this with a fine tooth comb to see if there are any issues there.
-
I've never found WMT's a reliable resource for backlink info, often it does not show all backlinks also when backlinks are removed it takes some time for them to disappear.
How recently were the yellow pages and city search links added?
Definitely run the site through OSE, majestic and AHrefs for a better picture as William suggested.
A couple of other things you could check
Go to WMT -> Health -> Crawl Errors to see if any other pages are not found
Check how many pages are being indexed to make sure there are no sitemap issues etc
Hope that helps
-
You may want to try other backlink checkers. I don't believe any tools get 100% backlinks. Use WMT, Open Site Explorer, Majestic SEO, and others to get a good number.
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
-
Strange landing page in Google Analytics
Hello MOZ Community, The website in question is https://x-y.com/ When i looked at the landing pages report in GA , x-y.com is appended at the end of every URL like this. https://x-y.com/x-y.com When i open the above URL in GA interface, it shows page not found. This is obvious as there is no such URL.
Reporting & Analytics | | Johnroger
The metrics like sessions, Users, Bounce rate all look good. In the property settings, The default URL is written like this http:// cell-gate.com (Please note that s is missing in property settings). But how is traffic tracked correctly How do i solve this problem. What settings should we change to make the landing pages report look ok Thanks0 -
Query on Google Experiment?
Hello All, I am doing A/B testing via google analytic experiment now my query is for my ecommerce site homepage i am trying to add newsletter in 3 different way so it will be variation A, Variation B and Variation C. So my query is what should be then original page? Currently there is no newsletter form on homepage. Do I consider original page as Variation A? i.e. abcd.com?variation-A as original page? Then google will decide winner between original page i.e. variation A and Variation B & C Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | dsouzac0 -
How to track in google analytic which filters selected in which category?
Hi All, Can anyone tell me how to track which filters selected in which category like in category I have 1) price ( then different - different price) 2) color ( then difference - difference colors) same for size, width, brand etc. Is it possible to track in detail via tag manager? Other than tag manager what are the best way to track filters? Please explain me technical guidance too. Thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | adamjack0 -
Webmaster Tools Average keyword position
Hello! For the last month i have notices a drastic change in Avg.position for a keyword on my clients site http://livoart.lv keyword: "kapu pieminekļi". According to webmaster tools it went from 13 to 4-2. The problem is that in orgranic search i keep seeing the keyword on the second page and the CTR of the keyword did not change at all. Why would webmaster tools show false data?
Reporting & Analytics | | AlexElks0 -
Track PDF's in Google Analytics
Hi Mozzers, Is it possible to track PDF's via Google Analytics/Google tag manager? I'm not only looking for PDF downloads but for the actual activity when someone opens an interactive PDF document. So would it be possible to have onclick events on buttons in the PDF etc... Many thanks!
Reporting & Analytics | | WeAreDigital_BE
Sander0 -
How can I track my rankings on Google Images?
I noticed a small amount of traffic coming from a particular very generic keyword. Being pleasantly surprised that we are ranking for this, and after some digging, I found that we are actually ranking in Google images, rather than in the web results. How can I track whether other keywords are ranking in Google images? I use Rank Checker to track keywords in the main web results, but this doesn't have a function for Google Images. Help please - thanks.
Reporting & Analytics | | TheJewelleryEd0 -
Verify web master tools ?!?!
Randomly today google web master tools all of a sudden wants me to re-verify my site and is giving me the error: Verification failed for **http://www.shiftins.com/ **using the Meta tag method (less than a minute ago). We couldn't find the verification meta tag. but if you view the page source it is clearly listed..... this happened only today while no changes were made to the site. Does anyone have a solution?
Reporting & Analytics | | shiftins0 -
Google +1 and ranking effect .
Anyone have any experience as to what effect google +1 has on ranking? Trying to figure out what impact it might have. Ecommerce site in norway selling childrens clothing. Atm we are ranking 25th for main targetted word childrens clothing (barneklær in norwegian). on google.no this has a difficulty of 34. None of main competitors have any amount of google +1's on their site. Lets say if I in some way could manage to get 100 ppl to push +1 button. Would this affect our ranking at all ? Might be impossible to answer but if anyone has thoughts about it I am interested. Thanks
Reporting & Analytics | | danlae0