Search Engine Optimization Programs | SEO Tutorial Program

Savvy Internal Linking for SEO

There are a few basic tips and tricks for savvy internal linking for SEO. Firstly though, we will take a quick look at the key principles of internal linking in search engine optimization. Internal linking is when you link from one post on your blog to a separate post on the same blog, or one article on your website to another one on the same website. What you are aiming for with smart internal linking is to provide a strong internal linking structure for both readers and search engine spiders. One of the resulting benefits of this approach is to make your site appealing, so each article interlinks with other articles. The purpose for doing this is to keep readers on your website longer and to make it easier for them to view more pages. Increasing user accessibility to more articles, and a positive web experience with good, strong useful content is an important key to building repeat traffic and savvy internal linking with an eye on SEO plays a big part in this.

Effective use of anchor text is central to internal linking. Anchor text is the hyperlink text that you click on to go to another page or even another part of the same page. If your article is about fishing, you may have anchor text that for example says, salmon swimming upstream. It needs to give the reader some indication as to what the link is about, so steer clear of non-relevant anchor text like the overused direction to "click on this link."  This is not necessary anyway as almost everyone is so familiar with surfing websites that it is common knowledge that if you click on a link it will take you to another page or another website.

The internal linkage of your website is important. Search engines take note of all of the links from both external sites and the internal links on your own site, and give a value to each page. The number of links and the importance of them in relation to the pages they come from helps to determine ratings such as page rank.

While some webmasters say that page rank holds less weight nowadays because page rank alone does not necessarily equal traffic and sales conversion, they admit that they do keep an eye on it anyways just in case.  Apart from page rank, the general feeling is that there is more value in internal linking, SEO wise, as it helps more site pages to get crawled by search spiders when search engines visit, by pointing to pages deep within your site.

From the point of view of a reader, internal linking directs readers to other related articles of interest. Savvy internal linking for SEO gives the reader more entry points to your articles or blog posts, and more gateways to other articles which in turn also supplements other navigational aids such as menus and sidebar links.

If you are a WordPress blogger, many WordPress plug-ins are an absolute gift for search engine optimizing. This is due to the fact that plug-ins are constantly being updated or replaced, especially as new versions of WordPress are released. These plug-ins are definitely worth experimenting with if you have not yet for the advantages they offer in optimizing your site. A helpful WordPress plug-in is the Related Posts Plug-in, which automatically displays a list of posts similar to the article you have written. These post titles are listed under your article, and are automatically generated according to what the plug-in determines are your key words.

This is another reason to pay attention to sound SEO techniques. If you find a lot of irrelevant articles listed, you can go back and tweak your search engine optimizing. All the titles are displayed as hyperlinks, providing another level of internal linking. This makes it easy for the reader to locate useful related articles. Offering them more of what they are interested in provides them incentive to stay on your website.  

Whether you have a website or a blog, savvy internal linking for SEO is a good approach to satisfying both readers and search engines.