by The AlphaRank Team | November 6, 2024 | SEO
You most likely know that SEO is a great way to help your website achieve better visibility on Google. The thing is, SEO is not just about good quality content and efficient keywords. Links, in addition to high-quality SEO content, represent the main things that Google pays attention to when it ranks pages.
While external links to authoritative sources are helpful, internal links are most important. Internal links help you tie your disparate pages together. Good SEO practices draw on internal linking so that their strongest pages receive the most links. Google looks at internal structures of linking as an indicator of which of its pages you think are most valuable for visitors.
Knowing how too few or too many internal links weigh negatively on page rankings, the ideal number of internal links per page will be integral according to SEO best practices.
The number of internal links to place on any one page will vary and depend upon its purpose, the length of the content, and the relevance of the links in question. Although there is no defined minimum, SEO professionals believe the average number of links should be around five to ten per 2,000 words. This means adding an internal link every 200-300 words.
Relevance counts. Google frowns upon filling up pages with internal or external links, much like it does with keyword stuffing. Pages that are light on content will have fewer internal links organically, while content-heavy pages-like trending news articles-will be able to hold more links without batting an eye.
Also, anchor text of the links must correctly describe content to which it would link. Linking from snowboard page using ski keyword anchor text would look spammy and unhelpful for users of your site.
When Too Many Internal Links Are Not Good for SEO?
According to John Mueller, a senior search analyst at Google, one should beware of overdoing internal links. With too many links, you take away some of the structural clarity of your website, and in that way, it becomes much harder for the search engine bots to understand what your page covers regarding topic coverage.
If a page has over 150 internal links, Google may crawl it never, which begs for an important reason to make sure you’re only linking to relevant information within your website. Remember, any links in your header, sidebar, or footer are going to count toward this total.
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Best Practices for Internal Linking in SEO
Now that you know how many internal links per page you should have, let’s see how best to set up the actual practices. First, let your website be filled with SEO-optimized content; regularly add strategic and relevant blog posts. With this in place, you can actually use the following practices when creating your internal links:.
Dofollow Links: Create your link without “nofollow” HTML tag links. Google cannot index links with the nofollow tags. Your HTML should reflect “dofollow.”.
Use of Appropriate Anchor Text: This is the text that informs the reader what they can expect after they click the anchor text. It has to be some form of descriptive words or phrases. Not necessarily exact keyword matches. Also, avoid linking longer phrases- not more than 5-7 words and avoid phases like “click here” because these hold no value.
Link Content-Rich Pages: Strongest internal can link two content-heavy pages, such as two comprehensive blogs of similar subjects or blog post out to core product or service page that drives leads, sales, or other valued types of return.
How to Interlink Informational Blog Posts
For example, you may have written a long blog post about deep cleaning homes and wish to link to an older post that talked about the best cleaning products. This internal linking could help both pages rank better because the Google bots have clear insights into how your pages are related, and readers can read on in a way that makes sense.
This also ensures an organic development of the keyword profile for specific topics on your website.
Internal Linking by Pillar Pages
Marketing-wise, linking an informational blog post from the top to a middle/bottom-of-funnel core service pillar page increases general relevance and ranking for those main pages.
This is a very important structure for targeting high competition, high volume search keywords. When your blogs get great keyword ranking and traffic, you can pass on some of the value with internal linking.
This applies much the same with white-hat link building. If you’re investing in backlinks-such as through guest posting-it’s always much more effective to link back from such content to an informational, unbiased post rather than directly to product or service pages. A direct link from a guest post to a service or product generally acts as a signal to Google that the link may not have any authenticity or educational intent behind it. Google algorithms are increasingly proficient at detecting suspicious backlinks.
Instead, link back to an informative blog post and include an internal link from that post to the core product or service page you want to promote, passing on that link equity.
Adding New Links to Old Articles
After it was published, you will be able to go in and adjust the internal links of each page to make your SEO even better. Refreshing old content is a practice where you go back to older blog posts and update them with current and relevant links. Make sure to correct any outdated information.
If you’re not sure which the pages should form the pillars from which your linking strategy emanates, you may want to consider trying an SEO content audit to find where the opportunities for internal linking may lie.
How Internal Links Are to be Constructed
Internal links on your site should be constructed in a manner to aid the crawling of Google bots on your pages. Ideal internal linking is in the shape of a pyramid.
The front page of your website serves as the main entrance and points, through internal links, to subpages or pillar pages where you would house more detailed information about the company and its products, and how to contact it. These then would link to specific item pages, thereby making Google’s job of indexing your site that much easier, which can help raise your ranking in searches.
Let Us Help You Determine the Right Number of Internal Links Per Page
Knowing what the suggested number of internal links per page is well and good, but if you are too busy with managing other facets of your business, addressing this task, that is where we come in! AlphaRank team of seasoned SEO content strategists are here to help with creating new strategic content, updating old pages, engaging in link building, and improving your internal linking strategy. Contact us today to learn more!
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