NOTE: this is an announcement of a PRO-only tool.  If you're not PRO you can take a peek at what you're missing :)

With the launch of our SEOmoz Labs initiative, we have some freedom to quickly launch data and tools which either introduce something new and powerful (like Blogscape) or highlight improvements and mashups of tools and data we've already got.  Today we're launching a retooled Backlink Anchor Text Analyzer, powered by Linkscape.

We've long relied on Linkscape for anchor text and backlinks over the traditional tools (such as Yahoo! Site Explorer).  With our latest and greatest index update, we have statistical evidence to support that long experience. Recall our excellent, improved and improving external link coverage:

This new tool provides much of the same functionality you've probably grown accustomed to, like anchor text distributions:

Of course, we've also got links, along with a little extra Linkscape data: mozRank passed.  This will show you the links which are contributing the most to your global link popularity, along with which are not.  In my blog's case, that's my profile page from SEOmoz.  But we've also got a few mentions on some other neat blogs.

All of this is powered by the Linkscape index.  We're not doing any on-the-fly scraping or crawling, so it's pretty snappy.  All the reports I've done so far have come back in under 15 seconds.  If you guys know of tools that give you this kind of data faster than that, the engineer in me would love to see them.

There are plenty of surprises here, and lots of opportunities to see how some of your favorite sites (or your competitors) are positioned on the web.  You may find there are communities eager to link to content like yours that you are missing out on.

We think that, with unlimited access for PRO members, this tool is a really nice step between the free-for-anyone Linkscape Basic Report and the credit-based advanced report. If you're a PRO member, check it out. If not... well, check out the basic report :)