Link analysis going Crazy. Next Linkscape update. Multiple Problems

[Gyorgy]

They often remove the lower quality sites from the OSE index, so probably that's the reason for the drop in linking root domains.

[CompleteOffice]

Yer but ones lost hundreds of links, and ones lost thousands of links, and I know they both have very active SEO campaigns , also it hasnt added on my fb shares and likes. how long does the link update take to complete?

[Gyorgy]

You can read more about OSE here, and the update schedule is here.

The last two index updates were also index clean-ups. Some of our clients lost a few dozen linking root domains and thousands of links. One client had 34,000 links before the index update, now 25,000.

[CompleteOffice]

Fair enough. Today, I have been to a couple of high quality sites that I know our link is on, but didn't show in the latest run of link analysis, I went back to the site our link was on and its still on there, and theres no reason this site should be taken off.

[seanmccauley]

Same here. I realise the 'OSE is looking to give better quality results and therefore only crawls the top pages of the web.' argument, but two .ac.uk (.edu equivalent here in the UK) links with DAs of 70+ and PAs of 45-50 are no longer appearing.

Are these not  considered to be in the top part of the web? And that's just the start, several of our higher DA links are now missing from OSE, and (consequently?) our DA has dropped along with the PA of several of our top pages.

Links have disappeared from major manufacturers websites on pages with PA of >50 pointing to another site I run (and yet, the links are still active). I don't see how this is an 'index clean-up'

I completely understand removing links from brand new blogs with PA/DA of 1/1, sites that are still sandboxed, or deeply nested pages with very little authority, in order to improve overall performance.  As it is, using PA and DA as a means of  measuring how successful our SEO efforts are is becoming less useful - has it dropped due to something we've done or is it an 'index clean-up'. For the same reason, using it to determine which links are worthwhile getting has lost some of its value too.

[CompleteOffice]

I agree, it appears SEOmoz have really messed up

[Gyorgy]

Totally agree. It's confusing for the clients because we use PA/DA in the monthly reports and the recent DA drops resulted in questions, whether we're doing a good job or not.

I always explain that the authority values are relatively calculated and their website is compared to the other websites in the OSE index but numbers are just numbers and when a well trusted graph starts declining, I'm always in an inconvenient situation.

It would be great to hear more info about OSE updates, especially because we, the PRO users, support the development.

[CompleteOffice]

Thumbs the question up to get SEOmoz's attention

[Confetti_Wedding]

Same story here I'm afraid. I'm a HUGE SEOmoz advocate but things seem to have gone slightly haywire with the latest OSE update. Our site has lost almost 200,000 links! Yikes! I'm not a massive 'link counter' and tend to focus on quality rather than content but we have active links from great resources such as the BBC and the Guardian newspaper which are no longer showing in our OSE report. I presume this is the reason our domain authority has dropped from 64 to 58.

I'll tweet Rand and SEOmoz and point them in the direction of this thread as there seem to be a few disgruntled customers here.

[ShaMenz]

If you have concerns about changes in data with the latest update, the quickest and most effective way of getting answers is to email the Help Team direct using help [at] seomoz.org.

Moz Staff do not routinely read the Q&A,so are unlikely to be aware of issues unless they are specifically alerted to an thread by an Associate who happens to see it.

[CompleteOffice]

We need to make them aware, because this many unhappy clients, and i am sure there are alot more when everyone woke up and logged on this morning. They need to sort this as it may become really really bad for them

[CompleteOffice]

Nice 1. Yer tweet them and make them aware. Ill do the same to.

[ShaMenz]

I am not disputing that SEOmoz need be alerted to an issue.

My point was that an email to the Help Team when this thread was originated 8 hours ago would have alerted SEOmoz that there was an issue much more quickly.

Sha

[CompleteOffice]

I emailed them 3 hours before I started this post. Reliable service huh

[ShaMenz]

For updates on this issue, please follow @SEOmoz on Twitter.

Tweeted in the past few minutes:

Good morning everyone. We've seen the tweets and Q&A about OSE and will update here with information soon.

[KeriMorgret]

A slight correction is that the help desk staff doesn't routinely read the Q&A, but other SEOmoz staff and associates do read Q&A. I personally try to read every new question that comes in, but am myself on Pacific time and don't see things right away when they come in overnight. Emailing help at seomoz.org is the best way to report a problem like this.

An OSE engineer did just come into the office and is aware of these Q&A threads and will be responding soon. We're so sorry that there have been problems, and we're working to resolve them as soon as possible. Sha Menz, thank you so much for helping out here.

[KeriMorgret]

Hi everyone,

First, there was an update last night, and I believe we've adjusted the calendars now.

We're actively tracking down what happened. What the team really needs now is domains affected. If you could respond here with the domains involved (if you're allowed to share them) that would be great, otherwise, please send an email to help@seomoz.org with "OSE Domains" in the subject line so they can filter the incoming messages that way.

Thanks for your patience everyone!

[CompleteOffice]

my domain was affected: www.completeoffice.co.uk. thanks

[Confetti_Wedding]

Hi Keri, Thanks for your response. The domain involved for me is confetti.co.uk Thanks again, Brendan.

[randfish]

Hey gang - there's a thread going around the SEOmoz engineering + help teams on this topic today. We're researching what happened right now, and Kate Matsudaira, our VP Engineering, has promised to leave a reply once she's got the full story. We'll try to be as transparent as possible here and as fast as we can as well, but Linkscape investigation can take some time due to the massive complexity of the system.

Thanks for posting responses and please do keep suggesting sites we're missing, pages we might not have crawled but should have, large drops in metrics (particularly if/when they're outliers to the rest of your competitors/other sites in your sphere).

Thanks much!
Rand

p.s. Normally, I'd be much more involved in this myself, but today's my anniversary with my wife and we're on vacation in Southern Oregon. Don't worry, though, I only take one each year, so typically I'm better able to respond fast.