The reason I am asking if it is safe to use google webmaster tools again is for 3 reasons: 1) I have aherfs and they suck at detecting backlinks for some sites ( like mines). It shows I only have 20 backlinks wile majestic SEO shows I have 700. 2) Majestic SEO only shows me I have 700 backlinks but when I check all the backlinks I built last month, I have at least 1,100 which is indexed in google but not showing up in majestic seo. The only backlinks I see in majestic SEO are the ones I got from blog networks. 3) I need some way to check my backlinks accurately to see if my anchor text is over optimized and by how much. So this leads me to the conclusion that the only way I can do this is by using WMT. But I remember that ExtraWinner and a few other people suggested not to use it but at this point I really don't know what to use. Dose anyone have suggestions?
For Majestic hit "Historic Links" instead of using their fresh index and it will show more (if you haven't already done this)
I think it's safe to use, they're only showing you the amount of links that they have accounted for you sites in accordance with how they're ranking them. They're not really dead on either though, search queries are off, ranks are off, links that are for sure indexed are not showing up, etc... I still use them but make sure not to search for any BH terms while logged in. Analytics is the one that everyone says is a no-no
using WMT will get you banned - and smoking banana peel will get you high! Seriously, think about what WMT is. It is google sharing some of the information they have on your site with you. You are not giving them anything more than they already have.
When you add all of your websites to WMT, Google can quickly confirm see all the sites you have personally confirmed as owning. Is it coincidence that my best performing sites have never been in WMT? I don't know, but I sure don't want to give Google any more info then I need to.
I've never stopped using GWT. Google is going penalize you with or without it. It's not like they don't have the information elsewhere.
I don't know if its just a coincidence, but since I removed any mention of Google from my sites they all rank better. Google doesn't provide you with WMT because its such a nice fella, they have an agenda. Until I find out whats the agenda is I am not going to participate.
couldn't agree more with this! you are not giving google any information by having a WMT account. I could see the argument not to use WMT if you have a bunch of black hat sites, but if you don't, then you are not giving them any information...
Why is analytics bad to use? I cant see what is wrong with using any of the programs google offers, because like others have said, they already know everything they are showing us threw their tools. Ive heard people say before that if they deindex 1 of your sites, they may deindex them all, but if im making whitehat sites, and the only thing im doing wrong is building backlinks, googles algos will see that no matter what anyways.
What are you giving them that they don't already have? Well it should be obvious that if you put a tracking code on your pages you're giving access to your visitor stats. Imagine for a moment that Google had access to stats for every website in the world... that would be bad right? (I hope you said yes.) The more that people use these tools, the closer you get to that reality. It's not a smart idea to give anyone a full list of the sites you control. I don't know how this fact could be lost on anyone in the business of SEO.
Personally I have removed all of my sites from WMT. I've talked with some big SEO consultants and while they do do alot of white hat stuff they have removed their sites as well from WMT. This may just be the short term anyway, maybe I'll do a case study in the future where the only difference between two sites is using WMT or not.
If you have a number of sites and dont want to link them together; why not create individual WMT for each? I still use WMT as I find it quite helpful. Thats just me tho
