Imagine your website as a garden, where each page represents a unique planting bed.

Internal links serve as the pathways that guide visitors on a journey through your garden, helping them explore new plants and ideas. Expert gardeners meticulously design numerous well-marked paths and ensure no dead ends exist.

Similarly, in your website garden, having plentiful pathways to your engaging content can enhance user experience, boost organic search rankings, and increase site engagement.

Best practices for internal linking

Developing an effective internal linking strategy is crucial for guiding users smoothly through your site and enhancing your SEO performance. Here are some key guidelines to keep in mind:

• Develop a logical site structure, encompassing URLs and ecommerce categories or folders.
• Establish a comprehensive library featuring the most crucial content for your audience.
• Link to the most pertinent and valuable content that users might wish to explore next.
• Use anchor text that is concise, effective, specific, and relevant.
• Strategically place links; those higher on the page are more valuable as they suggest the next step for users.
• Enhance navigation in headers, footers, sidebars, and breadcrumbs, including pages tailored by topic, intent, category, or purpose.
• Strike a balance in the number and distribution of links.
• Utilize anchor/jump links to direct users to specific sections within a page.
• Understand the use of nofollow, particularly for sponsored links.
• Set clear expectations and processes for your SEO and editorial teams.
• Regularly update internal links with new content publications.
• Conduct regular audits of internal links, optimizing them based on site searches, multipage sessions, dead clicks from heatmaps, and user testing.

Effective copywriting for anchor link text

Internal link anchor text checklist

Effective anchor text should be clear, concise, and beneficial. It should:

• Display well on both mobile and desktop devices.
• Be easily clickable on mobile.
• Not detract from the main content.
• Clearly indicate the action or information available upon clicking.
• Avoid repetition or over-optimization.
• Include relevant keywords.
• Prevent ambiguity or overlap with other pages.
• Be distinctly formatted as a link.
• Avoid generic phrases like “click here” or “read more.”
• Integrate naturally into the content flow.

Excellent anchor text goes a step further by:

• Using compelling verbs, adjectives, or implied actions to encourage clicks.
• Guiding users to the next relevant stage in their learning or purchasing journey.
• Suggesting the click will provide valuable information or answers.
• Offering additional information to establish your expertise, even if the link isn't clicked.

Ask yourself: What would users do?

If unsure about the quality of your anchor text, read the surrounding text and click the link. Consider what users might expect or do:

• Would users anticipate what follows after clicking?
• What if users don't understand this part of the content?
• Are users ready to proceed to the next step in the buying process?
• What if users fall into one of the previously mentioned exceptions?
• Can you help users choose different paths based on their needs?
• Is there a logical next step on your site?

Examples of effective internal linking

Here are some case studies on link text from a user's perspective, with suggestions for clearer, more specific, and helpful optimization:

• Instead of: Click here

• Try: How to choose, Get your free report

  • User: “I know this is a link. Why should I click it?”

• Instead of: Get help

• Try: Chat with support, Talk to an expert

  • User: “Help from who? I don’t want to talk to a person; that’s why I’m on your site.”

• Instead of: Buy now

• Try: Add to cart, Claim yours now

  • User: “Will I go to checkout next if I click this? What if I’m not done shopping?”

• Instead of: Learn more

• Try: Estimate your cost, Get costs for your state

  • User: “I don’t want to learn more; I want to buy. Why won’t you just give me the price?”

• Instead of: Read reviews

• Try: Search 300 user reviews, Read reviews (4.5 stars)

  • User: “Whose review is it? Why should I trust it? What can I do with that info?”

• Instead of: Contact us

• Try: Get a free quote, Email support

  • User: “How can I get someone to come help with my problem?”

• Instead of: See if you qualify

• Try: Apply for pre-qualification with 500 credit, Get your free credit score

  • User: “Why can’t you tell me if I qualify? If you can’t tell me, I probably don’t qualify.”

• Instead of: Find out how

• Try: Compare 13 options, Find your local pro

  • User: “Why can’t you show me the answer?”

• Instead of: Get solutions for your needs

• Try: Try the quiz to find your perfect tool, Compare the best picks

  • User: “How do you know what I need?”

• Instead of: Shop now

• Try: Filter by style, Filter by color/size, Filter by occasion

  • User: “What’s the best way for me to narrow down my options?”

How to audit your internal links

You can conduct basic internal link audits using free tools or tools you likely already have access to, such as Google Analytics and Google Search Console.

SEO plugins like Detailed SEO and All In One SEO are useful for quick checks on any page.

Internal link audit tools

• Ahrefs
• Screaming Frog
• Search Console
• Google Analytics
• Plugins like All In One SEO, Detailed, Yoast, Ahrefs, etc.

Internal link audits to run

Start with a basic internal link audit to identify and fix broken links and orphan pages lacking internal links to enhance crawling. Then, focus on optimizing links and link text:

• Identify and fix broken links.
• Check for canonical links.
• Analyze link distribution.
• Export link title text.
• Find orphan pages.
• Search for internal link opportunities.
• Filter for link text cannibalization.

How to measure the impact of internal linking

After refining your internal linking strategy, training, and processes, monitor these key metrics to gauge your success in maintaining linking best practices:

• Number of internal links/backlinks per page: Measures how well you're linking to your own content.
• Pages per session: Indicates how many users are navigating to another page via internal links.
• Bounce rate / Engaged sessions: Shows how many users are interacting with your content versus those who aren't.
• Orphan pages: Tracks the number of pages without any internal links from other pages on your site.
• Page depth: Assesses how many clicks it takes for a user to reach a given page from the homepage.

15 common internal linking practices to rethink

As internal linking strategies evolve, many seek straightforward answers to common linking questions. However, SEO often requires context-specific answers.

Google recognizes outdated linking tactics, so attempting to manipulate the system is unlikely to yield sustainable results.

Rather than following the latest trend blindly, it's essential to understand the rules and maintain flexibility.

Here are 15 internal linking scenarios that SEOs must consider:

• Use the exact same phrase every time you link to that page.
  • Problem: This is a known spam technique that can make your site appear overly optimized for SEO rather than user-friendly.
  • Solution: Use a variety of top keywords and consider different contexts for each page.
• Link any words that could be relevant to that page, even if they’re not the exact keywords you’re targeting.
  • Problem: This can lead to cannibalization if all linking signals appear similar to Google.
  • Solution: Target specific keywords and find the most relevant linking opportunities.
• Include as many links as possible on each page.
  • Problem: Google may only crawl around 150 links per page, including navigation, so excess links won't add value.
  • Solution: Prioritize the most relevant links at the top and ensure navigation doesn't exceed the crawl limit.
• Never add links at the top of the page. That’s like telling the user they’re on the wrong page when they just got here.
  • Problem: Some user intents are ambiguous, and users might land on the wrong page.
  • Solution: Guide users to the correct content if there's a chance they need a different answer. Clarify content relevance on both pages.
• Don’t link to the same page twice on the same page.
  • Problem: Google doesn't penalize duplicate links, but they count toward your link crawl limit.
  • Solution: Include multiple links if they serve a purpose.
• You can include hidden links and Google will still count it.
  • Problem: Hiding content from users is generally not recommended.
  • Solution: If a link isn't relevant enough to show users, remove it.
• Link copy should be as short as possible.
  • Problem: Overly short link copy might lose its meaning.
  • Solution: Keep link copy concise but clear, and ensure it's clickable on mobile.
• Links to your site should open in a new tab to increase engagement stats.
  • Problem: Google Analytics doesn't count engagement in different tabs, and users may not expect this.
  • Solution: Maintain a consistent user experience and let users decide where links open.
• Links to external sites should always be nofollow.
  • Problem: If you don't want to pass link equity, why link at all?
  • Solution: Link only to high-quality external sites.
• Never include links to external sites. You should only include internal links (links to your own site).
  • Problem: Relevant external links can build credibility and trust, especially in page sources.
  • Solution: Link to valuable and relevant external sites to enhance user experience.
• Don’t start a sentence with a link.
  • Problem: Sometimes, the most relevant place for a link is at the beginning of a sentence.
  • Solution: It's acceptable to start a sentence with a link, just as you can start with a preposition.
• Don’t include links in headers because it looks weird.
  • Problem: Users often pay more attention to headers and appreciate clickable information.
  • Solution: Use heatmap data to determine if links in headers are beneficial.
• Don’t include links in specific sections/pages because it could break the code.
  • Problem: Users don't care about code limitations.
  • Solution: Collaborate with your development or tech SEO team to understand and improve linking flexibility.
• My team shouldn’t worry about linking. That’s for some other person/team to worry about.
  • Problem: If only one person manages linking, finding new opportunities becomes challenging.
  • Solution: Educate everyone on linking responsibilities and best practices.
• We don’t have time to add links now. We can just add links later.
  • Problem: Adding links to new content can expedite crawling, and avoiding it means more work later.
  • Solution: Establish a process for adding internal links as new content is published or updated.

Future trends in internal linking

As SEO tools evolve, we can anticipate more automated internal linking suggestions within CMS platforms.

It would be beneficial to have comparison metrics against competitors, perhaps via an AI-powered link bot that analyzes SERPs for your page’s top keywords and counts internal backlinks on similar competitor pages.

Ultimately, a solid understanding of internal linking fundamentals will enable SEOs to leverage these advanced tools effectively in the future.

Contributors to Search Engine Land are selected for their expertise and contributions to the search community. They work under the guidance of our editorial staff, and their content is reviewed for quality and relevance. The opinions expressed are their own.

The above is the detailed content of Internal links and SEO: Best practices, examples and tips. For more information, please follow other related articles on the PHP Chinese website!