Links showing on Goo is 3, links on Alta Vista is 379?

[Ev_olution]

When I do the {link: www.widgets.com} test on Alta vista I get 379 websites linking to my website. When I do the same test on Google I get 3 linking in! I've had my site up for three years. How can I get Google to register those links? Most of them are PR 4-5 I would guess.

Thank You,
Ev

[tedster]

Google sees your links -- they just don't report anywhere near what they have in their records. This is intentional on their part. They only say that the link: operator will return "pages that link" ...not "all pages that link."

Nevertheless, whether they show the links or not, they are using them to calculate ranking.

[Ev_olution]

Why would they do that? Show only 3 of 379?

That does explain why I am bopping around 4-12 in the rankings. They must be counting the links to rank that high.

Is there an easy way to find your page rank? I'm on a mac, in case that matters.

Thanks,
Ev

[SEOPTI]

LOL, they don't count your links to rank high. If this world would be so easy to understand .... Forget Page Rank checking, you already see your real time Page Rank which reflects your rankings, a toolbar is not needed.

[edited by: SEOPTI at 1:33 am (utc) on Oct. 16, 2006]

[wanderingmind]

Showing a few links is what Google does. It was done to avoid SEO-types getting too much information, wasn't it? Illogical from the point of view of someone who tries that search, however.