When people talk about linking, particularly in terms of SEO, backlinks are often the priority. However, there are other valuable ways to use linking to improve the authority of your website. By utilising one of the most forgotten aspects of on-page SEO, you could improve your ranking without building backlinks. Internal linking is often misunderstood, but when implemented correctly it can be a powerful way to structure and improve the performance of your website. Keep reading to learn more about how you can make the most of linking without relying on a single backlink!
What Is Internal Linking?
Internal linking is the practice of connecting two pages of your website using hyperlinks. These links serve two purposes. The first one is to help users navigate your website, and the second is to help search engines understand the relationship between the pages of your site. Unlike external links, internal links keep your authority and visitors on your own domain instead of linking out to other sources.
The Different Types Of Internal Links
There are a few different types of internal links. These include:
Navigational Links: Often used as part of your website’s main menu, sidebar or breadcrumbs, your navigational links help your users to find the most important pages on your website quickly.
Contextual Links: When a link appears within a body of text, it’s known as a contextual link. These help search engines understand topical relevance and keep users engaged by providing easy access to similar content on your site.
Footer Links: Your footer links appear at the bottom of your webpage, and often point to main menu items as well as key resources such as cookie policies and contact page.
How Does Internal Linking Compare To External Linking?
Internal and external linking are both important aspects of your website’s SEO. However, the two are very different.
External Linking
External links reach out from your website to other websites, providing the other website with a backlink. When you link to another site, it passes on authority signals which indicate that the source you’re linking to is useful and trustworthy. This is something that works both ways, and is the main reason why backlinks are so sought after. If other websites are externally linking to your website, your authority and trust are improved, which can result in better ranking.
Internal Linking
Why Internal Linking Is Good For SEO
You may be wondering why internal linking is worth doing. There are several reasons why it helps towards your SEO efforts. Here’s a helpful diagram to show you which areas internal linking benefits the most:
Can Internal Links Be As Effective As Backlinks?
There’s no easy way to answer this question, but the short answer is: maybe. Internal links won’t serve as a replacement for the authority you can gain from high-quality backlinks, but they can help your underperforming pages to rank better and push content into Google’s index faster. If your website is already doing well and needs just a little nudge up the search results, internal linking could be very effective without the effort associated with gaining backlinks. In some cases, smart internal linking can help content to rank even when it doesn’t have any backlinks at all.
Internal Linking Best Practices
By now you’ll have a good idea of how helpful internal linking can be. Therefore, now is the perfect time to learn how to do it properly. Here are the five golden rules of internal linking:
- Use descriptive anchor text. Things like ‘click here’ are a big no-no. Use natural, keyword-relevant words and phrases to link to your pages.
- Link from high authority pages to new or low-authority pages. The authority from the more established pages can give your other pages a boost.
- Don’t overdo it. Too many internal links can look spammy, dilute in value and confuse your website’s users.
- Try to minimise the number of clicks required to get to any page. The general rule is that no page should be deeper than 3 clicks within your site’s architecture.
- Link deep. By this, we mean that you should place links to valuable content that might be buried deeper in your site in top-level pages. This will help to reduce the number of pages on your site that are difficult to get to.
Internal Linking Mistakes To Avoid
On the flip side, there are also a few common mistakes people make with their internal linking strategies. These are easily avoided, so keep an eye out and ensure that you don’t do any of these things:
- Don’t stuff keywords into your anchor text. Only use relevant words and phrases that feel natural.
- Don’t link to irrelevant content. You should only add internal links with topical relevance that add value to your readers.
- Don’t use the same anchor text for multiple different pages. It’s confusing for users and search engines, and makes it unclear which page is the most relevant for the anchor text you’ve used.
- Don’t neglect orphan pages. If any pages on your website have no internal links pointing to them, this is a problem that should be addressed.
- Don’t ignore your mobile users! Ensure your internal links are tappable and that the structure of your site is completely mobile-friendly.
How To Audit Your Internal Links
Whether you have a large site and haven’t given much thought to your internal linking or have a small site and have done extensive work on your links, you should carry out regular audits. Internal link audits give you an overview of your website’s structure and how easy it is to navigate. Crawling your site with free software like Screaming Frog is a great way to identify orphan pages (pages with no links pointing to them), link depth, anchor text and broken links.
Boost Your SEO Efforts With Search4Local
At Search4Local, our SEO team work hard to develop bespoke internal linking strategies. They can improve your website’s structure and ensure your links are natural, easy to navigate and send the right signals to search engines. Contact our friendly team today to learn more about how we can help.
Written by Alice Farley
