Backlinks--are they really that important?

[pranavbhat]

hi guys,
this is just a question i had while surfing the web?
I was just surfing the web and went on to amazon.com and they had a PR of 9.
so, i checked the backlinks of amazon.com and it had 0 backlinks!!

And for all these days i have been told and i have read how important are backlinks to get a good PR!!

So, i have wonder how did amazon get a PR of 9 with 0 backlinks!!

Can someone please explain!!

Thanks!!
Cheers!

 

[Randall]

No friend it is not true. Do you believe amazon has 0 backlinks?

Here is just a peek at what kind of backlinks they have.

Google: 2,870,000 links for amazon.com
Yahoo: 174,443,797 links for amazon.com

 

[pranavbhat]

hi,
how did u find that....
i mean....i went to amazon and in the google toolbar PR button it said PR 9...then i clicked on the toolbar and selected the backlinks button and this is the page which it shows....here is a screenshot!!

http://comparelinux.com/images/amazon.JPG

Please comment?

Thanks!!
Cheers!

 

[Randall]

Friend it can be found with many online link popularity checking tools.

Here are some
iwebtool.com
smartpagerank.com
backlinkwatch.com

This will give you proper numbers for it.

Moreover you can also search in google itself.
Example search query will look like: link:nameslot.com

Where the search operator is link: and then comes the domain name.

But here also remember one thing that it doesn't shows all the backlinks for that particular domain name.

 

[pranavbhat]

hi nameslot,
i did the same thing...
link:amazon.com
please see the screen shot!!

 

[Randall]

There maybe some problems in it.

Try smartpagerank.com or iwebtool.com :grin:

It will show you good figures.

 

[nielsencl]

"amazon.com" and "www.amazon.com" are not the same thing...!!!

try it with the "www" and you will see the "real" reasults.

Now, to answer your question, backlinks have some importance, but keep this in mind:

- The type and quality of a backlink can vary, and have more or less importance.

- PageRank is NOT just about links. Linking is a big part, but so is content and many different things.

- You can have traffic without much PageRank. (nielsentech.com)

- You can have PageRank without much traffic. (mesothelioma-search-engine.com)

 

[nick]

Yes I also have one site that has PR 5 and I have never made any links for it. It was just available domain name and I registered it. When I uploaded a script on it and in the coming update it got PR 5 just like that. I even checked for the backlinks for it. It is just that the pagerank depends on backlinks but no one has yet uncovered the exact algo for it.

 

[jignesh]

It is true that pr is only depends on back links,i have created one new blog to promote one site and i put its link on my pr4 site.there was only one pr4 back link for that blog and it got pr2 in pr updates.

so more links from higher pr page worth well to getting pr.

 

[nielsencl]

Most people think that PageRank is just based on links, but I think the truth is that links are a big factor, but there are other things that are considered as well. Here are some thoughts.

My memory of Google's explanation was as I just described above, but in reviewing their information again, they seem to only talk about linking:

PageRank Explained

PageRank relies on the uniquely democratic nature of the web by using its vast link structure as an indicator of an individual page's value. In essence, Google interprets a link from page A to page B as a vote, by page A, for page B. But, Google looks at considerably more than the sheer volume of votes, or links a page receives; for example, it also analyzes the page that casts the vote. Votes cast by pages that are themselves "important" weigh more heavily and help to make other pages "important." Using these and other factors, Google provides its views on pages' relative importance.

Of course, important pages mean nothing to you if they don't match your query. So, Google combines PageRank with sophisticated text-matching techniques to find pages that are both important and relevant to your search. Google goes far beyond the number of times a term appears on a page and examines dozens of aspects of the page's content (and the content of the pages linking to it) to determine if it's a good match for your query.

So I'm not sure if they are more focused on links then before or just trying to hide the fact that they also consider other things like content, structure, domain age, HTML standards compliance, bad links, frequency of updates, etc.

I have been saying for 2-3 years that at some point linking will not be as important. I still think that is true, but I don't have a clue when that will happen. I say this because you can have a junky site, get a lot of links (good links) and get PR. So you can manipulate the PR (and rankings I guess) just by getting more links. That's just like the old practices of keyword-stuffing and making doorway pages, so I don't know why it is still allowed as much as it is. IMO, linking should be much less of a factor.

Everyone that cares about their site and getting traffic to it should spend some time looking through Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

 

[seowits]

Well I found yahoo search that gives much accurate backlink figure. As far as popularity of any particular website concern it just based on the mass visitors traffic that trust and buy its information, services and products. They got naturally backlinks which are enough to maintain their Pr i think search engine, pr's dose matter at the start of new website but when it becomes a brand these things doesn’t matter enough.

Today how many people don’t know about google? Its answer will make you understand enough

 

[Randall]

Today how many people don’t know about google? Its answer will make you understand enough

Yes marketability of the domain also matters. If it is a brandable domain name on which this site is running then its brand name should be a solid one.

Backlinks are just a way to get PR, Good SERP's and eventually the exposure that the site needs to become an established site.

 

[seowits]

thats true Nameslot. but i think a natural clickable idea can make the diffirence you can see 'youtube'