Popularity of a site?

[priyanka-m6.net]

Hi guys,
What tools do you use to find out the popularity of any site?
How would you rate Google toolbar,Alexa rating, Netcraft toolbar?

[davesplace1]

I think Google's toolbar is the best. You know your site is popular when strangers keep linking to it :)

[James]

They're all full of ****, and shouldn't be trusted except for very general glimpses.

Traffic is all that matters.

[Clicksor]

I like Alexa, it seems accurate and is a good way to see what is popular. Also go check out whois.sc, thats one of my favourite websites of all time! :)

[Peter T Davis]

I think Google's toolbar is the best. You know your site is popular when strangers keep linking to it :)
Only if you're talking about link popularity. If you mean traffic, then Google's toolbar is worthless.

[dondor]

best way is yahoo, since google bothers to update their backlinks info only once in a while, yahoo does it every couple of days and you could really see the effect.
just don't forget to search using http:// for ex:link:http://www.yoursite.com

I've forgot a couple of times and just searching for link:www.mysite.com does not bring results.
MSN backlinks is also pretty good, so you could use it as well.

[kingsimon999]

Alexa rankings can be manipulated simply by visiting your website three times a day witht the downloaded toolbar.

Anyone could get into the top 100,000 if they did this for three months. Believe me I have tried it.

Alexa is a nice guide though.

[deronsizemore]

best way is yahoo, since google bothers to update their backlinks info only once in a while, yahoo does it every couple of days and you could really see the effect.
just don't forget to search using http:// for ex:link:http://www.yoursite.com

I've forgot a couple of times and just searching for link:www.mysite.com does not bring results.
MSN backlinks is also pretty good, so you could use it as well.


What would doing this at yahoo, MSN or anywhere else tell you?

[dondor]

The potential of backlinks that would appear in the next google links update (as not all would screen through googles algorithm).
But a better way to determine you site link popularity is through this link:
http://www.trafficzap.com/linkpopularity.php - I had one better, but can't seem to find it now.

[Webanetics]

Ranking.com is another way to see how sites match up - I've found it's a pretty good way to see the overall popularity an indiviual site - it's good also for finding link partners.

[jonnyhilfiger]

I think it is inevitable the Google will use the Analytic data for this type of information. Google PR and Google Analytic data = a tonne of information for Google which they will either publish in some form or keep for themselves to better analyse behaviour online which they can use for advertising business.

John

[James]

Well, I think that Google realises that they couldn't use Analytics, because it's too small of a ratio of people using it vs. people not using it, and it would give an advantage to some sites, whereas some sites can't get that same advantage because they're not using it.

[moonshield]

They already get all this information with adsense.

[tracer]

I use google toolbar to measure a site's ranking or popularity. I think it's the most commonly used.


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[dburdon]

Alexa is inaccurate but a guide to magnitude. MSN shows the most backlinks.

[thebillionaire]

alexa can be useful, if you dont cheat it

[etech-martin]

I think google toolbar is nice tool and iwebtool.com is also nice tool that includes many more tools along with link populariy. :)

[Doug]

I don't like alexa just because it is only reading info from people who have the toolbar downloaded. I don't have it downloaded and I'm sure a few people who come to my sites are in the same boat as me.