Why You Should Use Technorati and Google Blog Search Bookmarklets

Researching on what other blogs are writing on a specific product, website or program is useful because it not only enriches your own personal knowledge but provides you with reference sources and ideas for the creation of content.

The easiest way to find out what other bloggers think about a specific website is to do a quick query for it on a blog search engine.

Typing in the website name will usually show you who are writing about the specific site. However, you might also want to examine the type of links a specific website receives from other bloggers

Discovering who links to a website is a form of competitor analysis, which is particularly important when you are in a crowded niche.


Using the Google Blog Search and Technorati Bookmarklet

These bookmarklets will allow you to immediately find out who is linking to the specific webpage you are on. Here are the instructions how to install and use them:

1. Visit this page to grab the bookmarklets.
2. For Firefox and Safari browsers, drag the bookmarklets onto your toolbars.
3. For IE 7 users, right click on the bookmarklets and select ‘Add to Favorites‘.

When you want to find out who is linking to a specific webpage, simply click on the bookmarklet when you are on the page itself and you’ll be taken to a search results page with all the sites linking to it.


Technorati or Google Blog Search

Technorati highlights the anchor text for the link and allows you to sort by authority as well so you can find out which are the bigger blogs (by link count) which link to a specific site.

Google blog search allows you to search via a specific timeframe, such as blogs linking in within the last hour, 12 hours, one week or months. You can also add the search results feed to your Google homepage or create an email alert.

Both of the search engines show different amount of results for the same webpage. According to Technorati, 3,486 unique incoming links point to Dosh Dosh’s homepage whereas Google Blog Search says that 2,081 blogs are linking in.

Pick the one that suits your usability needs or personal preferences and use both if you prefer to have a comprehensive overview.

Don’t forget that both search engines allow you to subscribe to the results via RSS feed so you’ll be updated whenever a new site links to the website you are observing.


Why Should I Use these Bookmarklets?

Finding out who is linking to a specific site is useful for many reasons. You can use this data to improve your knowledge on a topic, examine your competitors, do research for articles or even build links for your websites.

Here are some of the benefits of discovering what blogs link to the page you’re on:

• Link Building. Someone willing to link to a relevant competitor might be willing to link to you as well. Visit the blogger’s web page to send them an email about your website or company.




• Network with your audience. Find out who is linking to your site and visit these blogs to leave comments or say hi. Both bookmarklets allow you quickly target specific pages of your site.




• Research for an article. Writing a product review or a linkbait and need more information? Visit the blogs linking to the specific website and learn more about the topic. Remember to credit your sources if you use their ideas.




• Generate exposure for your website. New blogs need market their content in order to build an audience. One easy way to do so is to trackback relevant articles when you are writing a blog post. Find who is linking to your topic and include the best articles as references.




• Credibility check. Want to sign up for a new website or buy a new eBook but need to know if they are legit? Examine what bloggers say when they link to the specific website and make your decisions from there.




• Learn from other websites. One way of understanding how to be successful is to examine the success of others. Take a look at the blogs linking to a successful or authority site in your niche. Find out what makes people link to them and implement the same or an even better strategy.

I’m sure there are many other ways to find out who links to a specific website but these bookmarklets seem to be the quickest and most efficient way to do so. I love the one-click functionality and I’ve been using them quite often for research purposes.

These tools might be new to you and hopefully they’ll be helpful in some way.

Found this post useful? Consider subscribing to Dosh Dosh’s blog feed.