What is link Popularity? Link popularity is a general representation of the total number of web pages which link to a website (or individual web page). Most of the major search engines support the "link:" operator. Type in “link:” (without the quotation marks) in front of the URL about which you want to learn.

What does this tool do? This tool will query all the major search engines (Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask) when you enter the “link:” operator with your chosen URL. It will return the total link count for each URL.

You will notice that the totals vary greatly from search engine to search engine; this is because the figures shown represent the number of inbound links that are known to that search engine (which will vary based on the size of their database). Most of the search engines (Google especially) also apply various filters against the inbound links; therefore, some inbound-links may not be counted toward the total.

Why is link popularity important?. Link popularity is important because it is a major factor used by search engines in determining a site's position in search results. Generally, a site with more inbound links will be positioned higher than a similar site with fewer links. Other factors that are considered include anchor text.