Open Site Explorer - Link Export Not Showing Same Number of Links

[EEE3]

Noob question. I'm using Open Site Explorer to hunt down some external links for a website. In the attached image (post-pressing the filter button), it says I have 889 external links, but after I've downloaded the CSV, I only get 695 links.

Why the difference in number? And if I'm doing something wrong, how do I make sure I'm getting the full amount of external links to my client's website?

Thanks!

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[MeganSingley]

Hey there! This is Megan from SEOmoz. Great question! So, the drastic difference in the number of links is because we'll only show you the top 25 links per domain. Our API that we use for OSE currently has a total limit of up to 100,000 links for any domain, so we only show the top 25 because if, for example, someone has 500,000 links and most of them are from the same domain, then we wouldn't want to fill up all 100,000 links with the same domain information and leave out links from other important domains. Instead, we'll only show the top 25 based on page authority so we can show the links from other sites without the same domain taking up all 100,000 spaces. In other words, we want to show you your link diversity.

I hope this helps explain things! If you have any other questions, let me know.

[EEE3]

Hi Megan,

Thank you for the response, but I still don't know if that answers my question.

Does this mean in my particular case that I can navigate through the full 889 reported links only in Open Site Explorer, but I cannot export that full 889 (well below the 100,000 links) to CSV? If I export to CSV then I only see 695?

Can you speak a little more about the difference between viewing external links in OSE vs. exporting links to CSV?

Thanks!

[MeganSingley]

Hey Ellen!

In the OSE interface, we'll tell you how many links you have total, but we'll always only show you a maximum of 25 links per domain, whether it be in the interface or in the CSV export. Also, the link per domain max applies regardless of how many links you have. So, if you only have 1 linking domain, but 75 links from that same domain, we'll still only show the top 25.

The data in exporting to a CSV versus the interface in OSE is the same, but exporting to a CSV gives you all your link information on the same page and can make it easily sortable.

I hope this helps! I know this can be confusing, so if you have any other questions, please let me know!

[EEE3]

Makes a little more sense. I'll get it eventually

Thanks Megan!