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I agree with Ryan completely.  I would only add that the ultimate metric is your ranking for keywords, and as you are the only one who knows what is happening to your site and link profile, you need to track and measure everything to see what effect your changes have. Link scape is a great tool, and certainly one of the best on the planet. But it, like any of the tools need to be assessed with an understanding of the task they undertake, their methodology in doing so, and a clear understanding that it, and all tools , are guides, mere hints if you will, as to what is happening in the hallowed halls of Google search.