Written By Nicholas Cardot66 Comments
5 Things You Need To Know About Trackbacks
Awesome Content: Set Up For Online Success
I’m sure that for many of you a trackback is as foreign to you as seeing a full set of teeth at a Willie Nelson concert. However, if you’ve been blogging for any time then I’m sure you seen the word around the blogosphere.
A trackback is actually much simpler than it sounds. Let me break it down for you like my 1st grade teacher used to do for me. If you link to another blogger’s article from your blog, then a link back to your site will appear in or around the comments of their article.
Using trackbacks has many advantages and in this article I’m going to explain why you need to jump in and take advantage of them.
It’s one of the best gifts you can give a fellow blogger.
It seems that at every holiday you find yourself bombarded with commercials letting you know what the perfect gift is for your friend or loved one. They have the ideal hair restoration kit for your dad at Father’s Day and they have the perfect necklace for mom at Mother’s day. They have the perfect toys for your kids at Christmas.
Check this out. One of the best gifts that you can give to a fellow blogger doesn’t even cost a penny. Not only that, but you can give it at any time of the year.
Just link to someone’s article and you are presenting them with a tremendous compliment and a gift that is really going to benefit them.
Remember how upset your wife was the lat time you forgot her birthday and didn’t get her anything? Well, most bloggers won’t get upset with you when you don’t link to their posts, but they probably will be very excited and thankful when you do.
It helps drive traffic to your site.
You might be surprised how many people browse through the comments and trackbacks and click through to the user’s websites. I do this nearly every day at the blogs I follow. I figure that if they are reading, commenting, and linking to a site that I really admire then maybe their site will have similar content and be worth looking into.
It increases your Google page rank.
Page Rank is a 1 through 10 numerical indicator that Google assigns to web pages to note how important that page is. Page rank is then used as a factor in determining where a page should be listed in Google’s search engine. Pages with a page rank of 10 will usually get listed above sites with low page ranks.
Not all trackbacks, however, will increase your Google Page Rank. In fact, on most sites they don’t. This is actually exclusive to some sites as most avoid this.
Google’s search bot only follows certain links. Links with the ‘nofollow’ attribute do not count towards page rank. Most webmasters add that tag to comments and trackbacks to avoid getting spammed with people’s useless comments just because they want to build the page rank of their own sites.
At Site Sketch 101, we don’t use nofollow on our comment and trackback links. If you link here, we’ll share the page rank right back to you. This is a great reason why you should consider both commenting and linking to our articles.
It helps you build relationships with other bloggers.
Relationships in every area of life are extremely valuable assets. I’m sure you’ve seen the action movie where a spy calls in a favor from an old CIA operative that he knows.
Blogging is no different. There are things you can accomplish when you have friends that you just can’t get done on your own. You can drive traffic to their site and they can drive traffic to yours which can push both of your stats higher and higher. You may have a big contest going on and you may want to ask them if they would post on it.
But you have to build a relationship with someone before you can start calling in favors.
Linking to one of their articles is a lot stronger of a way to build relationships than most other things. Linking to a site tells the author that you are excited about their work and that you are not ashamed to let your readers know about it.
It builds your own credibility.
A lot of bloggers are afraid to link to other websites or blogs because they fear losing their visitors. Although you may lose some visitors, I believe whole-heartedly that you will gain even more visitors because of the credibility that you gained by sending someone to another site. If people are really pleased with the site that you sent them to then they will respect you and want to come back and see more of your links in the future.
HEY YOU! Yeah…you in the back there. I want your input. Leave me a comment and let me know what you think!
Nicholas Cardot
Nick uses his blog Site Sketch 101 to express his passion for helping bloggers and webmasters connect with real people through brilliant designs, unique content, and genuine creativity. Nicholas Cardot has 186 post(s) at Site Sketch 101
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George Serradinho said:
I have done this now and then when posting about great posts I have read. I think I will be taking this advice and see if it works for me.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
George Serradinho » I hope that you’ll stop back by here and let us know how it works for you.
Corinne Rodrigues » I’m glad that you find the site here and I’m really glad that you enjoy the material.
Corinne Rodrigues said:
I came across your site this morning and have been reading most of your posts – fabulous stuff – thanks!
Trackbacks work really well – I know from experience.
Take care.
Corinne
Chris Cline said:
Great Info Nick…..
Thanks…
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Chris Cline » Glad you liked it. Be sure to let me know if there is anything that you want to know more about!
Evan said:
Thanks for the post. I had a general idea about trackbacks, but not to the detail that you explained it. I think the hardest part for a new blogger is figuring out exactly how to do it. Does just linking back to the post url always work? As I understand, you may need to use the “trackback link” listed at the end of some blog’s posts for the trackback to appear in the other blog’s trackback section, but I could be wrong. If a blog doesn’t have that link, I think you can just add /trackback/ to the end of the post url (at least in WordPress).
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Evan » Great question and I’m really a goof for having overlooked that important part of this process. Let me try to explain it a little bit. First, it’s different with each CMS that you might come into contact with. With the newest versions of Wordpress your posts will display a trackback with a simple link to the post. With some other systems, you have to link to their custom trackback address which is used to ping their site about the trackback. Wordpress is way ahead of the curve in this.
If you see a location for trackbacks to be displayed at the bottom of a post and there is no custom url for you to put in, then all you should have to do is link to the article. If there is a custom url, then simply use that link instead of the link to the article. It will route the user through a log that will register the trackback and then it will forward them to the article.
Wordpress is neat because instead of needing that extra routing through a custom url, it actually notifies the other page as soon as you publish your article. Of course you have to adjust that setting under Settings / Discussion in order for it to work like that.
Valerie said:
This was helpful. I never really understood trackbacks. Thanks.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Valerie » Great! If you have any questions or input just let me know!
Jim Connolly said:
Nice post Nicholas.
I was explaining trackpacks and pings to a client yesterday. It seems there’s a lot less awareness of them than I thought.
By the way, I really like what you have done with the theme here – it looks great.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Jim Connolly » Thanks! Trackbacks and pingbacks are definitely less complicated than they used to be especially with the idea that most trackbacks don’t even require a unique url. Most of the time now you can just link to the article directly. I hope you were able to explain everything to your client alright!
Thanks for the praise on the site too!
Trozdol said:
Thanks for the explanation on trackbacking. I didn’t fully understand it before.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Trozdol » You’re welcome. I’m glad that it helped!
Ann said:
People discuss Google ranking like it’s a mysterious force, so I liked that you included an explanation of it.
You answered my biggest question about trackbacks in these comments: When are they automatic? Thanks to you and Evan.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Ann » One of the greatest feelings about running this blog is hearing that myself and those that contribute in the comments were able to help someone figure something out or understand something better. I’m so happy that we were able to help you out. If you have questions about anything else, please let me know and I can put together tutorials and how-to’s to help you out. Anything you need, just let me know!
Great reads ending 12 July 2009 | Serradinho said:
[...] 5 Things You Need To Know About Trackbacks – If you link to another blogger’s article from your blog, then a link back to your site will appear in or around the comments of their article. [...]
ubuntu101 said:
Some good information I had offered a similar question to the Twitterverse to get an idea about PingBacks and Trackback and with this article at least I found out 50% so thanks for taking the time to put this together I will be checking back in the not to distant future.
Take Care
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
ubuntu101 » If you let me know the other 50% of your questions I’ll try to answer them for you. I’m glad I was able to help you understand them better.
Shahriar Hyder » I’m thrilled that you learned from this article and that you are going to be sharing it. Thanks!
Shahriar Hyder said:
Excellent piece of information regarding Trackbacks! It has been a hieroglyphic figure to me until I stumbled upon your article Nicholas. This is worth sharing and I shall do so. Nice work mate. Keep ‘em coming!
You are now listed on FAQPAL said:
5 Things You Need To Know About Trackbacks…
Using trackbacks has many advantages and in this article I’m going to explain why you need to jump in and take advantage of them….
Pliggs said:
Excellent post. It amazes me how many bloggers refuse to allow trackbacks to be listed on their blogs.
Brian said:
Great article.. That’s what it’s all about.. proliferation of good content!!
I really like your blog’s style too!!
Mike said:
Hey there, just wanted to thank you for this very insightful, easy-to-read post. Much appreciated!
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Mike & Brian » Thanks. I’m glad you enjoyed it!
danineteen said:
I have to admit, I got bored halfway and didn’t read the rest ’cause it’s too early in the morning for me right now XC But I just had to ask one thing – is a trackback similar to a pingback? ‘Cause I blog on WordPress and they have pingbacks which basically do what you’re saying a trackback does.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
danineteen » For practical purposes they are same thing. The difference is basically how the two sites communicate with each other during the creation process but they both do the same thing.
Don’t worry about the whole “bored” thing. That’s why I create bold titles throughout the content so that you can skim through and pick out the information that you think is the most useful.
Ruchi said:
Great Post, Trackbacks really drives traffic to site.
Will Fowler said:
This was a very informative article thank you. -will
Blogging School said:
what I can say about trackback is only the fact that it is good for our bloggerhood. that’s all.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Blogging School » They are definitely good for our bloggerhood. It’s kind of like when you try to take care of your neighbors because you want your neighbors to take care of you. Have you used trackbacks very much on your blog?
John Sullivan said:
Wow could you imagine how it would be if every or even half the bloggers had your attitude? I’m also do follow and wish I could write a post like this
thanks
it’s coming LOL
I have been testing chat catcher for trackbacks etc seems to be doing a great job. I will be seeing YOU around
Stumbled
PS prepare for the Trackback
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
John Sullivan » Awesome! I think that a positive attitude and a passion for writing and connecting with people are the essential elements necessary for a successful blog. Thanks for stumbling and I’m looking forward to the trackback!
Mukund said:
Thanks for this wonderful tip. Easy to understand. I never understand track backs that clearly before this post. But now, yes!!! I got an idea about this. I should say this post is not as complex as it was on ProBlogger.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Mukund –> My goal is to take all the complicated principles of blogging and make them as simple as possible so that everyone can take them and put them to work at their own sites. I’m glad that you were able to understand it and take a good understanding of it with you.
21 Untapped Traffic Sources | BuzzBlogger.com said:
[...] Link Karma: How Linking to Others Can Get You Lots of Links in Return How to Do a Trackback to Get More Links and Traffic 5 Thinks You Need to Know about Trackbacks [...]
21 Untapped Traffic Sources « MARKETING 101…Tips for Your Business said:
[...] Link Karma: How Linking to Others Can Get You Lots of Links in Return How to Do a Trackback to Get More Links and Traffic 5 Thinks You Need to Know about Trackbacks [...]
akira07 said:
I think. looking for trackback is routin activity blogger should do if their wanna success
.
I’m also looking for it everyday by commenting, forum signature, etc…
About google pagerank, it’s make me wonder… Why i have so many trackback created on do-follow forum signature, but my PR is 0.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
akira07 –> Most pages inside of forums are usually page rank 0 themselves and they in turn deliver no page rank from their signatures.
akira07 said:
But i do 500-1000 post per month…Is there no effect at all? At least i’m appropriate to get PR1
Mukund said:
I just have one doubt with this trackback! Are trackbacks and backlinks same? I got this doubt because when I check the backlinks for my blog, it shows upto 31 links and when I check the stats in Alexa, it says 3 sites linking in where one is from Problogger. A small confusion!!!
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Mukund –> Alexa doesn’t track them all. Their stats are just strong estimates.
Mukund said:
Oh!! Ok!! Thanks for that information! But, I can trust what Alexa says! Right?
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Mukund –> Yes…for the most part. It should only be used as an estimate for traffic. A lot of it’s other statistics are rather crude…especially on sites that haven’t been in the top 100,000 for very long. My site is still so new that most of it’s stats on Site Sketch 101 are wrong or missing.
Mukund said:
Oh!! Thanks for that tip! Yes!! I know! It keeps varying at the initial stages. Once it is some 6 months or may be when it completes one year, things will become pretty constant!
akira07 said:
Hmm personally i didn’t believe alexa rank. It’s not accurate and can be cheated so easily.
How can blog in 1,000,000th+ position can become around 400,000-500,000th in just one week? It’s imposibble…Well, it’s just my personal opinion
Mukund said:
You need to check the same site after few months. I am sure it will drop back! I have seen examples of sites like you said. But, the truth is only sites that generate genuine traffic will have a permanent rank for a long time.
ZXT said:
Okay so in this article, how do I do a trackback?
akira07 said:
Hi bro, hopefully this tutorial is help you :
http://askax.net/2007/08/08/how-to-make-trackback-on-wordpress/
ZXT said:
Akire, sorry for the late reply. Thank you for the link, I will check it out.
My Latest Blog Post: Wednesday’s You’ve Got to See This!
Lian Vaiphei said:
Hi Nicholas,
Thanks for the great insight on trackbacks.
I have 1 question. Is there a way to know if a blog would accept trackback to their post?
Best regards,
Lian
akira07 said:
I think there is no blog refuse to get trackback
. So, i think trackback is always welcome.
Nicholas Z. Cardot said:
Lian Vaiphei –> Pretty much, the only way to check is to see if their are trackbacks at the bottom of any of their posts. I don’t know of any other ways to check.
Lian Vaiphei said:
Following the advices I decided to allow trackbacks to my post (i am using wp).
I use the freetrafficsystem.com which allows you to post your articles on other similar niche blogs.
Today, I am receiving too many trackbacks from those blogs. My concern is what if one or a few of them are a bad site in the Google’s eyes.
Any advice Nick?
Lian
My Latest Blog Post: Try The Online Paid Survey For The Extra Income, The Best Home Business
Nicholas Cardot said:
Lian Vaiphei –> I don’t use sites like that to promote my blog. I don’t want random article showing up on my blog because I think that it would reduce the quality and the personal flavor that I have going on here. So I don’t want to publish my articles on random sites that don’t care about quality. I’m not going to promote my blog like that. I’m going to promote mine only through legitimate friends and people who’ve been inspired here to go back to their sites and link to the articles here.
Remember I was asking you about trackbac… « Two Friends And A Blog said:
[...] 22, 2009 Reply Tags: Blog (10), Friends (8), trackback Remember I was asking you about trackbacks? I found a cool article about the topic. Check it out. Am testing it here. [...]
21 Untapped Traffic Tips | Road To The Riches™ said:
[...] Link Karma: How Linking to Others Can Get You Lots of Links in Return How to Do a Trackback to Get More Links and Traffic 5 Thinks You Need to Know about Trackbacks [...]
21 Untapped Traffic Sources « joshtalk said:
[...] Link Karma: How Linking to Others Can Get You Lots of Links in Return How to Do a Trackback to Get More Links and Traffic 5 Thinks You Need to Know about Trackbacks [...]
Ron Boracay said:
Oh, how come I overlooked this article of yours Nick. Anyway, its better to be late than never.
OK here are my points:
You said:
“Pages with a page rank of 10 will usually get listed above sites with low page ranks.”
If you are pointing about “listing on the SERP’s”, page rank has no or little to do with it. I have read many seo tests as well as seen many small page rank sites listed above on a certain keyword among higher page ranked sites.
You said:
“Links with the ‘nofollow’ attribute do not count towards page rank”
There is no definite explanation yet about this. This is highly debated on the Search industry. Although, nofollowed links wont boost your rankings, it doesn’t mean it can increase/decrease your page rank.
Just my 0.02 cents Sir!
Alan said:
Nicholas
Hi! I’m a newbie in blogging . Please at look my website above . Initially I was very happy a few people link to me . But today I’ve found out that all the links were pinging back to me . What should I do ? When I click on their w.site it says the webpage cannot be found . But yesterday it was ok !
Plase help what should I do — > u can email me .
Thanks
Alan
My Latest Blog Post: My Best Decorating Tips for your Child’s Bedroom
Nicholas Cardot said:
Alan –> I just stepped over and checked out one of your trackbacks and it seems to be working just fine. You’ll have to show me which one is broken for me to help you out.
21 Untapped Traffic Sources | Internet, Marketing, Enterprenuership said:
[...] to Others Can Get You Lots of Links in Return How to Do a Trackback to Get More Links and Traffic 5 Thinks You Need to Know about Trackbacks [...]
Web 2.0 said:
Well I also didn’t try that yet… Let me try when posing my next article
Boni said:
Thanks Nicholas, firstly i want to say sorry, i write to many comments, but i don’t want to spam, just want to say that You Are Incredible, you give many tips and tricks that make me cleverer than einstein i think, ha2.. I am a new blogger so i want to learn as much as possible.
My Latest Blog Post: Hack Your Firefox Speed to Unlimited
BloggersFix.com » Blog Archive » 21 Untapped Traffic Sources said:
[...] Link Karma: How Linking to Others Can Get You Lots of Links in Return How to Do a Trackback to Get More Links and Traffic 5 Thinks You Need to Know about Trackbacks [...]
scheng1 said:
There are some forums with trackbacks too. I’m very grateful to those blogs and forums with dofollow tag.
My Latest Blog Post: Psychic energy and psychic ability
Nicholas Cardot said:
scheng1 –> The dofollow definitely makes commenting more worthwhile to site owners. I’m with you on that.