Trust Flow = Quality of Links<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Citation Flow = Sheer number of links<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n In my opinion, I see Trust Flow as one of the most exciting SEO metrics<\/a> because there is nothing else like it. But, before digging into what Trust Flow is all about, it\u2019s good to understand what Citation Flow is and the strengths and weaknesses of relying on these overall \u201cAuthority Metrics\u201d like Citation Flow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Citation Flow is essentially a measure of the overall site’s link equity. The Citation Flow is a number on a scale of 0-100, that predicts the authority of a domain or URL by looking at the number of links pointing to it. So essentially it\u2019s an \u201cauthority” metric that is meant to predict the overall amount of links pointing to your site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Other Similar metrics to Citation Flow:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The following aren\u2019t calculated in the same way as Citation Flow, as every company calculates their metrics differently. However, you could generally view the following as similar to Citation Flow:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Citation Flow does not take into consideration the quality of links<\/a>. This is a very important distinction that is often overlooked when analyzing these types of authority metrics. Trust is an extremely important factor in SEO (one of the most important, besides relevancy).<\/p>\n\n\n\n So why is it that so many SEOs seem to rely on only using DA, DR, CF (name your favorite metric)? To be honest, I am not sure. I personally would never rely on one metric and view that as gospel like I see so many in the SEO community do. There are so many metrics and measuring sticks we can use at our disposal to get a better overall picture. Usually looking at one metric is only one piece of the whole.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You know the old saying – it\u2019s not about quantity, but quality.<\/em> Though it is a cliche, it is certainly true in the case of obtaining backlinks. And it\u2019s one you must be very aware of. Otherwise, you will start to look at these authority metrics as an absolute, definitive metric. But they aren\u2019t definitive. They are all relative, paint a partial picture and can be (fairly easily) manipulated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An example is, you can have two sites with very similar Citation Flow, yet only one of the two is getting the lion’s share of traffic. That\u2019s because these metrics look at the sheer quantity <\/em>of links, not at the quality or relevancy. Since we all know that Google is much more sophisticated than such a simple analysis, why would we judge site under the same premise?<\/p>\n\n\n\n The reality is that Google looks at so much more. Google doesn\u2019t look at the quantity<\/em> of links alone, they look at quantity<\/em> through a lens<\/em> of quality, trust, relevance & more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So why is Citation Flow (or any other authority metric such as DA, DR, etc) not enough by themselves?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Simple: Because they can be manipulated and they don’t tell the full story.<\/p>\n\n\n\n An example would be this: Imagine a black hat SEO was to build thousands and thousands of cheap, easy links on article directories, PBNs or other low-quality link sources. In this case, it’s likely to raise the Citation Flow, DA, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But how well do you expect the site to rank and receive traffic? Not very well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n They could be a talented black hat and use a quality PBN, but still, Google would likely catch on in the future (near or distant) and the site’s traffic would plummet – but the Citation Flow wouldn’t plummet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So you can’t really judge how good a linked profile is based on the Citation Flow alone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That’s where the beauty of Trust Flow comes in. It takes a 2-D picture and adds a little more dimension – the dimension of Trust. This is why it’s such a unique and important metric for SEO. Since it is dealing with trust, Trust Flow is much harder to manipulate than Citation Flow, Domain Authority, Domain Rating, etc.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was around 2012 when Majestic SEO came out with new flow metrics called Citation Flow (CF) and Trust Flow (TF)<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At that time, people were still relying on PageRank, MozRank, etc. Majestic’s new tool was actually pretty revolutionary when it came out, compared to the metrics people were using at the time. And guess what? Trust Flow is just as useful today, if not more, as Google’s understanding of natural links has gotten better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n TF looks at the quality<\/em> of links, rather than an emphasis on quantity like all the other metrics (CF, DA, DR).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Comparable to Trust Flow:<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Trust and quality of links:<\/strong> That\u2019s where Trust Flow comes in and is where Majestic really separates themselves from the competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Like CF, Trust Flow is represented as a scale of 0-100. It is a prediction of the overall quality of those links. Said another way, Trust Flow is a prediction of how trustworthy<\/em> a domain or specific webpage is, based on its links.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The way Majestic calculates trust flow is by looking at a set of trusted seed sites first. Majestic SEO actually created a database of seed sites that they manually vetted and deemed “trustworthy.” These seed sites make the Trust Flow (TF) calculation possible. Essentially, the idea is that the closer a site is linked to the seed sites, the higher the trust flow score would be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Interestingly enough, Google may employ similar techniques for their updated PageRank<\/a>, in order to gauge trust. So this is assuring to see that Google may be using a similar metric within their PageRank algo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I believe Trust Flow to be such a valuable metric for SEOs. TF is a unique SEO metric and one that I consistently use. Overall, you can take the Citation Flow and Trust Flow metrics to gauge the quantity and quality of a link profile. TF just gives you that extra bit of data to look at.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Google’s claim to fame for their search engine algorithm for Google, was PageRank<\/a>. PageRank was a revolutionary idea at the time and forged Google’s path as one of the most successful companies in existence. PageRank was a new way to rank documents on the web. It worked by looking at the number of links that a document or webpage received. It was an ingenious method that made Google a far better search engine than Yahoo, Ask Jeeves or any other search engine of the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n PageRank was much more simple back in the early days and has advanced a lot since then. Google used to show a public version of the PageRank metric. Naturally, many SEOs would rely on this metric to gauge the quality of a backlink or site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, after around 2014, Google stopped updating the public version of PageRank. They still used it internally, but they stopped updating the public metrics. So PageRank became a thing of the past for most seasoned SEOs, but you still see people (likely those new to SEO or black hat SEOs) talking about “high PR” sites. If someone talks in this vernacular, it would be safe to assume that their advice may be a bit outdated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes, we know that Google is likely using PageRank internally, albeit a much more advanced version now. However, since they aren’t updating the public facing PR metric, there is no use for us SEOs to continue using it as a metric. It’s really old school SEO as far as I’m concerned and the only reason I talk about PageRank is when referring to their internal processes of how they rank websites – the theory behind how the search algorithm actually works. If you’ve never read about the idea of how PageRank works or reading the PageRank patents<\/a>, it’s actually quite interesting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Speaking of, that is one reason why I like SEO By the Sea<\/a> by Bill Slawski. They have a lot of blogs posts explaining various SEO patents in laymen’s terms. It’s also valuable actually reading the patents yourself since you can pick up even more info on how Google’s algorithm works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Since there is no PageRank (PR) anymore, SEOs have evolved and we now look at other metrics, such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Majestic<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Moz<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Ahrefs<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n SEO software companies came out with their own metrics. Moz came out with domain authority (DA), page authority (PA) and MozRank. Ahrefs came out with domain rating (DR) and URL Rating (UR). And Majestic came out with Trust Flow (TF) and Citation Flow (CF).<\/p>\n\n\n\n Google looks at a lot of things, but we can all agree that they are looking at the quality of links, the number of links, and the relevancy of links. These metrics just scratch the surface to what Google likely employees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Each of these measurements of authority has their own pros and cons, but the biggest benefit of Majestic is their Trust Flow metric. TF takes a look at the prediction of trust whereas most of these other measurements of authority don’t really focus on trust or quality like TF.<\/p>\n\n\n\n So how do you measure your Trust Flow? The most obvious choice is you can sign up for a subscription to Majestic<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Though you can sign up for a free subscription, there are many circumstances that a paid subscription is necessary. Sometimes you need to do a bulk analysis of multiple sites, such as when you are using trust flow for audits, link prospecting, and competitive analysis.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n If you are just wanting to check the TF and CF of your site though, then the free options listed below will work just fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You can also check your Citation Flow and Trust Flow for free by going to Majestic<\/a>, creating a free account<\/a> and adding your site:<\/p>\n\n\n\nWhat is Citation Flow?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/contentcreationv4.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/majestic-citation-flow-trust-flow-screenshot.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nCitation Flow Weaknesses<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Citation](\"https:\/\/contentcreationv4.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/citation-flow-weakness-bugs-1024x362.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nWhat about quality?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
Why Citation Flow isn\u2019t enough<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
What is Trust Flow?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"Trust](\"https:\/\/contentcreationv4.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/trust-flow-seo-sheild-1024x362.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nTrust Flow: A unique metric that measures the quality of links<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
How Trust Flow (& others) became popular<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
PageRank<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
RIP PageRank<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/contentcreationv4.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/pagerank-is-dead.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nNew SEO Metrics to the rescue<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/contentcreationv4.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/seo-metrics-serped-1024x283.png\")
<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\nHow to calculate your Trust Flow<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
![\"\"\/](\"https:\/\/contentcreationv4.local\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/majestic-seo.png\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\nHow to check Trust Flow and Citation flow for free<\/h3>\n\n\n\n