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5 Spreadsheet Tips for Manual Link Audits - Moz Blog

5 Spreadsheet Tips for Manual Link Audits

Posted by MarieHaynes

Link auditing is the part of my job that I love the most. I have audited a LOT of links over the last few years. While there are some programs out there that can be quite helpful to the avid link auditor, I still prefer to create a spreadsheet of my links in Excel and then to audit those links one-by-one from within Google Spreadsheets. Over the years I have learned a few tricks and formulas that have helped me in this process. In this article, I will share several of these with you.

Please know that while I am quite comfortable being labelled a link auditing expert, I am not an Excel wizard. I am betting that some of the things that I am doing could be improved upon if you're an advanced user. As such, if you have any suggestions or tips of your own I'd love to hear them in the comments section!

1. Extract the domain or subdomain from a URL

OK. You've downloaded links from as many sources as possible and now you want to manually visit and evaluate one link from every domain. But, holy moly, some of these domains can have THOUSANDS of links pointing to the site. So, let's break these down so that you are just seeing one link from each domain. The first step is to extract the domain or subdomain from each url.

I am going to show you examples from a Google spreadsheet as I find that these display nicer for demonstration purposes. However, if you've got a fairly large site, you'll find that the spreadsheets are easier to create in Excel. If you're confused about any of these steps, check out the animated gif at the end of each step to see the process in action.

Here is how you extract a domain or subdomain from a url:

  • Create a new column to the left of your url column.
  • Use this formula:

    =LEFT(B1,FIND("/",B1,9)-1)

    What this will do is remove everything after the trailing slash following the domain name. http://www.example.com/article.html will now become http://www.example.com and http://www.subdomain.example.com/article.html will now become http://www.subdomain.example.com.
  • Copy our new column A and paste it right back where it was using the "paste as values" function. If you don't do this, you won't be able to use the Find and Replace feature.
  • Use Find and Replace to replace each of the following with a blank (i.e. nothing):
    http://
    https://
    www.

And BOOM! We are left with a column that contains just domain names and subdomain names. This animated gif shows each of the steps we just outlined:

2. Just show one link from each domain

The next step is to filter this list so that we are just seeing one link from each domain. If you are manually reviewing links, there's usually no point in reviewing every single link from every domain. I will throw in a word of caution here though. Sometimes a domain can have both a good link and a bad link pointing to you. Or in some cases, you may find that links from one page are followed and from another page on the same site they are nofollowed. You can miss some of these by just looking at one link from each domain. Personally, I have some checks built in to my process where I use Scrapebox and some internal tools that I have created to make sure that I'm not missing the odd link by just looking at one link from each domain. For most link audits, however, you are not going to miss very much by assessing one link from each domain.

Here's how we do it:

  • Highlight our domains column and sort the column in alphabetical order.
  • Create a column to the left of our domains, so that the domains are in column B.
  • Use this formula:

    =IF(B1=B2,"duplicate","unique")

  • Copy that formula down the column.
  • Use the filter function so that you are just seeing the duplicates.
  • Delete those rows. Note: If you have tens of thousands of rows to delete, the spreadsheet may crash. A workaround here is to use "Clear Rows" instead of "Delete Rows" and then sort your domains column from A-Z once you are finished.

We've now got a list of one link from every domain linking to us.

Here's the gif that shows each of these steps:

You may wonder why I didn't use Excel's dedupe function to simply deduplicate these entries. I have found that it doesn't take much deduplication to crash Excel, which is why I do this step manually.


3. Finding patterns FTW!

Sometimes when you are auditing links, you'll find that unnatural links have patterns. I LOVE when I see these, because sometimes I can quickly go through hundreds of links without having to check each one manually. Here is an example. Let's say that your website has a bunch of spammy directory links. As you're auditing you notice patterns such as one of these:

  • All of these directory links come from a url that contains …/computers/internet/item40682/
  • A whole bunch of spammy links that all come from a particular free subdomain like blogspot, wordpress, weebly, etc.
  • A lot of links that all contain a particular keyword for anchor text (this is assuming you've included anchor text in your spreadsheet when making it.)

You can quickly find all of these links and mark them as "disavow" or "keep" by doing the following:

  • Create a new column. In my example, I am going to create a new column in Column C and look for patterns in urls that are in Column B.
  • Use this formula:

    =FIND("/item40682",B1)
    (You would replace "item40682" with the phrase that you are looking for.)

  • Copy this formula down the column.
  • Filter your new column so that you are seeing any rows that have a number in this column. If the phrase doesn't exist in that url, you'll see "N/A", and we can ignore those.
  • Now you can mark these all as disavow

4. Check your disavow file

This next tip is one that you can use to check your disavow file across your list of domains that you want to audit. The goal here is to see which links you have disavowed so that you don't waste time reassessing them. This particular tip only works for checking links that you have disavowed on the domain level.

The first thing you'll want to do is download your current disavow file from Google. For some strange reason, Google gives you the disavow file in CSV format. I have never understood this because they want you to upload the file in .txt. Still, I guess this is what works best for Google. All of your entries will be in column A of the CSV:

What we are going to do now is add these to a new sheet on our current spreadsheet and use a VLOOKUP function to mark which of our domains we have disavowed.

Here are the steps:

  • Create a new sheet on your current spreadsheet workbook.
  • Copy and paste column A from your disavow spreadsheet onto this new sheet. Or, alternatively, use the import function to import the entire CSV onto this sheet.
  • In B1, write "previously disavowed" and copy this down the entire column.
  • Remove the "domain:" from each of the entries by doing a Find and Replace to replace domain: with a blank.
  • Now go back to your link audit spreadsheet. If your domains are in column A and if you had, say, 1500 domains in your disavow file, your formula would look like this:

    =VLOOKUP(A1,Sheet2!$A$1:$B$1500,2,FALSE)
When you copy this formula down the spreadsheet, it will check each of your domains, and if it finds the domain in Sheet 2, it will write "previously disavowed" on our link audit spreadsheet.


Here is a gif that shows the process:

5. Make monthly or quarterly disavow work easier

That same formula described above is a great one to use if you are doing regular repeated link audits. In this case, your second sheet on your spreadsheet would contain domains that you have previously audited, and column B of this spreadsheet would say, "previously audited" rather than "previously disavowed".

Your tips?

These are just a few of the formulas that you can use to help make link auditing work easier. But there are lots of other things you can do with Excel or Google Sheets to help speed up the process as well. If you have some tips to add, leave a comment below. Also, if you need clarification on any of these tips, I'm happy to answer questions in the comments section.


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Seth's Blog : Control or resilience

Control or resilience

It's tempting to invest time, money and emotion into gaining control over the future. Security guards, written policies, reinforced concrete—there are countless ways we can enforce our control over nature, random events and fellow humans.

The problem is that while the first round of control pays huge dividends (keeping rabbits out the yard is a good way to make your garden grow), over time more control creates brittleness. The Maginot Line didn't hold up very well, and the hundred-year floodwalls don't work in face of a thousand-year flood.

The alternative is to invest in resilience, to build systems that can handle (or even thrive) when the unforeseen happens.

In one case, you can say, "when the roads are smooth, when you read the instructions, when conditions are ideal, this is the very best solution."

In the other case, you can say, "if people don't read the rider, if the unexpected happens, if there's a surprise attack, we won't be perfect, but it'll work better than any other alternative, which is a pretty good plan."

       

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luni, 8 iunie 2015

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis

Mish's Global Economic Trend Analysis


Driverless Trucks to Hit Alberta’s Oilsands Region Replacing $200,000/yr Operators; Big Layoffs Coming

Posted: 08 Jun 2015 01:55 PM PDT

The Alberta oilsands region and the ore mining regions in Australia use some of the biggest trucks in the world.



Above: Komatsu heavy earthmoving truck at the Tom Price iron ore mine, operated by Rio Tinto Group, near Perth, Australia.

Drivers of these behemoths cost as much as $200,000 a year. With that incentive, the push to driverless is on.

Big Layoffs Coming

The Calgary Herald reports on the and the "threat of big layoffs" as Canada's Oilsands Pave the Way for Driverless Trucks.
The 400-tonne heavy haulers that rumble along the roads of northern Alberta's oilsands sites are referred to in Fort McMurray as "the biggest trucks in the world," employing thousands of operators to drive the massive rigs through the mine pits.

Increasingly, however, the giant trucks are capable of getting around without a driver. Indeed, self-driving trucks are already in use at many operations in the province, although they are still operated by drivers while the companies test whether the systems can work in northern Alberta's variable climate.

That is about to change.

Suncor Energy Inc., Canada's largest oil company, confirmed this week it has entered into a five-year agreement with Komatsu Ltd., the Japanese manufacturer of earthmoving and construction machines, to purchase new heavy haulers for its mining operations north of Fort McMurray. All the new trucks will be "autonomous-ready," meaning they are capable of operating without a driver, Suncor spokesperson Sneh Seetal said.

For Suncor's roughly 1,000 heavy-haul truck operators, however, the prospect of driverless trucks has raised more immediate fears of significant job losses.

"It's very concerning to us as to what the future may hold," said Ken Smith, president of Unifor Local 707A, which represents 3,300 Suncor employees. Smith said Suncor has signed agreements to purchase 175 driverless trucks.

"It's not fantasy," Suncor's chief financial officer Alister Cowan told investors at an RBC Capital Markets conference in New York last week. He said the company is working to replace its fleet of heavy haulers with automated trucks "by the end of the decade."

"That will take 800 people off our site," Cowan said of the trucks. "At an average (salary) of $200,000 per person, you can see the savings we're going to get from an operations perspective."
Not Just Suncor

Some companies though will not comment on the prospect.

  • Imperial Oil Ltd. spokesperson Pius Rolheiser would not say whether his company was testing the trucks at the company's Kearl oilsands mine.
  • Shell Canada Ltd. said it is "exploring" automated hauling.
  • Canada's largest drillers, Precision Drilling Corp. and Ensign Energy Services Ltd., use high-tech drilling rigs capable of moving autonomously between oil wells throughout North America.

As soon as one company makes the push the others have to follow or their ongoing operating expenses will be higher.

These truck driving jobs will be the first to go.

Then again, please keep in mind Today's G7 Communique that seeks a 70% Reduction in carbon emissions by 2050, and 100% by 2100.

Apparently we don't need these stinking jobs anyway. They will be replaced by free wind-power from all the windbags in D.C.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

G7 Communique Seeks 70% Reduction in Carbon Emissions by 2050, 100% by 2100; Browsing the 44 Item G7 "Wish List"

Posted: 08 Jun 2015 11:29 AM PDT

G7 Communiques come and go. It's all much ado about nothing because nothing is ever done.

Here are 44 items from the Leadersʼ Declaration Communique for the G7 Summit June 7-8 2015 wish list.

44 Point G7 Wish List

  1. Take concrete action to address global warming
  2. Eliminate 40 to 70% of greenhouse gas emissions by 2050
  3. Decarbonisation of the global economy over the course of this century.
  4. Spend $100 billion a year on low-carbon strategies
  5. Start a carbon early warning system for noncompliance in small islands developing states, Africa, Asia and Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean
  6. Accelerate access to renewable energy in Africa
  7. Reaffirm ambition to make the Green Climate Fund fully operational in 2015
  8. Phase down hydrofluorocarbons
  9. Praise the Hamburg Initiative for Sustainable Energy Security
  10. Build on the "Kobe 3R Action Plan" for resource efficiency
  11. Protect the marine environment in conjunction with the International Seabed Authority
  12. Complete the unfinished business of the Millennium Development Goals, end extreme poverty
  13. Support women's entrepreneurship
  14. Enact financial market regulation
  15. Create a fair and modern international tax system
  16. Reduce trade barriers
  17. Emphasize the importance of freedom, peace and territorial integrity, as well as respect for international law and respect for human rights
  18. Condemnation of the illegal annexation of the Crimean peninsula by the Russian Federation and reaffirm our policy of its non-recognition
  19. Achieve High Levels of Nuclear Safety
  20. Achieve Maritime Security
  21. Strengthen Arms Trade Treaties
  22. Combating the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction
  23. Call on Iran to cooperate fully with the International Atomic Energy Agency on verification of Iran's nuclear activities
  24. Condemn North Korea's nuclear program and human rights violations
  25. Concern over Libya
  26. Resolve the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
  27. Fight Trafficking of Migrants/Tackle Causes for Refugee Crises
  28. Fight terrorism
  29. Support African Partners
  30. Support Afghanistan
  31. Support Reconstruction in Nepal
  32. Establish health care as a fundamental right
  33. Prevent Ebola outbreaks
  34. Combat Antimicrobial Resistances
  35. Fight neglected tropical diseases
  36. Leave no one behind, reduce inequality, accelerate the global transition to sustainable economies, promote sustainable management of natural resources
  37. Strengthen peace, good governance and human rights
  38. Combat hunger and malnutrition by 2030
  39. Help 500 million people via the Broad Food Security and Nutrition Development Approach
  40. Empower women, smallholders and family farmers
  41. Foster access to quality jobs for women
  42. Support the UN Women's Empowerment Principles and call on companies worldwide to integrate them
  43. Reaffirm our commitment to the initiative on Strengthening Assistance for Complex Contract Negotiations (CONNEX), aimed at providing multi-disciplinary expertise in developing countries for negotiating complex investment agreements
  44. Renew commitment to the Deauville Partnership with Arab countries in transition

The joke of the day comes at the tail end of the 17 page communique: "We remain committed to holding ourselves accountable for the promises we have made in an open and transparent way."

The only thing the communique left out was support for motherhood and apple pie. What a total waste of time and money.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com

Robot Teacher Gives Lectures in China

Posted: 07 Jun 2015 11:40 PM PDT

Meet Li-Li your new instructor.



Li-Li is a Charming Robot Teacher.

She gives lecture at Jiujiang University in east China's Jiangxi province.

Li-Li was developed by the intelligent robot studio of the University. She not only gives lectures on teaching material, she also communicate with students.

I made up the name Li-Li.

Mike "Mish" Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com