Solving Incoming Links Widget Problem in WordPress
If you are a WordPress user, then you’d probably notice the “Incoming Links” widget that reside in your Dashboard. Recently there’s been an issue with error message being displayed. Well, if you are looking for a solution, then read on.
The “Incoming Links” widget works by searching the web for any page that is linking to any page in your website (read my post about inbound link) And the way to do that is by taking advantage of the Google Blog Search.
By sending a GET request, one can get a search result in an RSS output. Then the WordPress engine (and its built-in function) will parse the RSS and show the result in widget that you can custom (how many records to show, etc.)
Well, if it’s a built-in functions, then why it’s not working?
Did WordPress made a flaw in the development phase?
I don’t think a world-class team such as the WordPress Development Team, would make such silly mistake. The one reason that might cause you the error, is probably the wrong parameter for the GET request (read about HTTP GET request).
Since a response, which is the output of a GET request, is replied upon the parameters that was sent. Then sending the proper request parameter(s) is definitely an important thing to look into. So, don’t expect something in return if you can’t define your request in the correct way.
Luckily, you don’t need to be a web programmer to solve the “Incoming Links” issue. All you have to do is: change the GET request to the correct syntax (the one that is acceptable by Google Blog Search). And here it is:
http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch_feeds?hl=en&q=link%3A[your-domain]&scoring=d&ie=utf-8&num=10&output=rss
Remember to replace the highlighted syntax with your domain name
Updated: I change the ‘link:’ part with ‘link%3A’
Now that you have the right command, you can change the broken “Incoming Links” Widget’s RSS Feed URL. Just mouse over the Title part of the Widget (on the far right side of the “Incoming Links” text) and you will notice a “Configure” link being shown, click it and change the URL with the new one.
Configuring WordPress Incoming Links Widget
Don’t forget to click one the “Submit” button after you finished with all the available options there.
That’s it.
Unless Google made some tweaking with their Blog Search Feed, that is all you have to do.
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Thank you so much for solving this issue for me. I couldn’t for the life of me figure out why I wasn’t seeing any incoming links since I knew there were plenty. Fantastic to have it fixed. Much appreciated.
I had been searching forever for the right link for the incoming links widget, none have worked till i saw your one
I cant thank you enough :-)
all the best
Well I am glad that you find this useful.
Thanks for dropping by ;)
I have tried adding your link and it still gives me an error.
The error = “RSS Error: WP HTTP Error: couldn’t connect to host”
Is this due to other reasons or is the link wrong?
I’ve tried this link (assuming that is you domain):
http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch_feeds?hl=en&q=link:bodyandspirithealing.com&scoring=d&ie=utf-8&num=10&output=rssIt return no result, means none has linked to you, yet. No need to worry, time will heal everything ;)
I found the issue to be in the URL:
http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch_feeds?hl=en&q=link:bodyandspirithealing.com&scoring=d&ie=utf-8&num=10&output=rss
I found that removing “link:” solves the issue
Didn’t fix it. WordPress 3.1
:kiki: Thank you so much. I just did a search when having a problem trying to figure this out, and you site popped up. I am so glad cause I didn’t know how to configure. I appreciate your post. Thanks, Sally
WordPress 3.2.1
Getting this error message in the incoming links widget.
RSS Error: A feed could not be found at http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch_feeds?hl=en&q=link:http://any1exercise.com&scoring=d&ie=utf-8&num=10&output=rss
What does this mean?
It seems you still got some problem with your widget.
It’s either because a server problem, or google simply don’t have any record upon your posts.
I am having this problem and I know that several bloggers have linked to my posts.
When I hover over the ‘incoming links’ widget nothing happens. The only option is to open or close the drop down that says ‘no incoming links have been found’ with no box for URL or anything else.
Am I doing something wrong?!
Any help would really be appreciated!
Well, it’s been around for sometimes that some backlinks just “being ignored” by Google, and since we’re using Google’s blogsearch for the widget, we abide to its rule.
I’ll see if I can make something out of this.
I get this error too, seems like it just started happening in last few weeks as I always saw linkbacks previously:
RSS Error: A feed could not be found at http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch_feeds?hl=en&q=link:www.justingermino.com&scoring=d&ie=utf-8&num=10&output=rss
I did exactly what you said… the problem persists.
Error en el RSS: A feed could not be found at http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch_feeds?hl=en&q=link:http://www.sebascelis.com&scoring=d&ie=utf-8&num=10&output=rss
Help please
Try to open that link directly from your web-browser, if it shows some result, then the WordPress engine is the one to blame to.
Worked well. Thanks Nichive :)