R.I.P. Yahoo SiteExplorer - Hello Bing Webmaster Tools
Filed in: Backlink Building
With the demise of Yahoo SiteExplorer last month, Mac website owners lost a really valuable, free tool for quick backlink checks. Several Safari SEO toolbar extensions and many free back link checking sites also became non-functional the day SiteExplorer was decommissioned.
Though by no means comprehensive, Yahoo provided a good sampling of many of your site's back links, generally ranked in order of site authority. It also allowed downloading a .CSV file of your current links for use in a backlink indexing tool for the added oomph of secondary link-building.
Bing's Webmaster Tools have had some significant improvements lately. Recently added is the ability to download their view of your backlink data - if you've verified your site with them. And I suggest you do. There's so much to learn from Bing's view of your site's pages, keywords and traffic. It's also helpful to your internet marketing efforts when you see what Authority sites Bing likes to use for ranking your pages. Those sites are very different from what GoogleBot, and even YahooSlurp tended to favor.
Own multiple sites and want to rank better in Bing? Note the referring sites you see in these link profiles. Many are good candidates for trying to get a link from for your other sites. Paying attention to Bing Webmaster Tools data can help all of us improve our sites rankings - and reduce our dependence on Google.
Because you MUST verify your site ownership with Bing - we now lose the ability to easily spy on competitor's link profiles - something SiteExplorer was great for. In that tradeoff, at least other competing site owners can no longer instantly see the highest ranking links BingBot tracks for your sites.
Though by no means comprehensive, Yahoo provided a good sampling of many of your site's back links, generally ranked in order of site authority. It also allowed downloading a .CSV file of your current links for use in a backlink indexing tool for the added oomph of secondary link-building.
Bing's Webmaster Tools have had some significant improvements lately. Recently added is the ability to download their view of your backlink data - if you've verified your site with them. And I suggest you do. There's so much to learn from Bing's view of your site's pages, keywords and traffic. It's also helpful to your internet marketing efforts when you see what Authority sites Bing likes to use for ranking your pages. Those sites are very different from what GoogleBot, and even YahooSlurp tended to favor.
Own multiple sites and want to rank better in Bing? Note the referring sites you see in these link profiles. Many are good candidates for trying to get a link from for your other sites. Paying attention to Bing Webmaster Tools data can help all of us improve our sites rankings - and reduce our dependence on Google.
Because you MUST verify your site ownership with Bing - we now lose the ability to easily spy on competitor's link profiles - something SiteExplorer was great for. In that tradeoff, at least other competing site owners can no longer instantly see the highest ranking links BingBot tracks for your sites.
