What Is Internal Linking and Why Is It Important in SEO?
What are internal links in SEO?
These are the hyperlinks that link content on two pages on the same website. Have you ever read the information on most websites and realize there are some words written in different colours? When you click on them, they redirect you to another page on the same site? Those are what we refer to as internal links in SEO. Every website uses this internal link for one purpose mostly, ranking.
Why are Internal Links vital for SEO?
Internal links give the websites pages opportunities to be indexed and ranked by google. Google has a bot that crawls the internal and external links present on website pages. The crawler goes through all the sites pages, and site relevant information thus adds the page to the list of pages available on google sites.
Adding internal links is a form of SEO marketing strategy to both your website and the services you render. Internal page linking gives your audience a variety of information to read. When your sites are more about the best fashion sense of bags and probably link that page to your store pages, that will redirect similar authority to the accessory’s pages. Users will have a pleasant experience working on your website, giving you an advantage with the search engine.
Internal Linked pages are the best for promoting keywords mostly used on your site. The search engine optimization will be able to identify the importance of those pages and rank them among the top part of the list.
How can you set up a useful internal link structure?
Most website is inbuilt that the most important content at the top and the least relevant pages positioned at the bottom. Many pages have similar essential pages at the top of their pyramid, homepage. Other pages that get the same authority are about us, product, and blog, though to some people, they are of less importance. Here is the best way to use internal linking structure SEO;
- Creating a vast content supply to your site
Websites mostly have a lot of content for the purpose of their readers. Internal links are bridges between the old and the new material for a page to be ranked and indexed. Creation of lots of content gives you more spaces for using the internal link marketing strategy. Ensure you can link previous posts to new post thus will be able to equally get to be indexed again.
- b) Confirm if there are any orphan pages
Orphan pages are those content without any internal links. These pages are not identified by Google, therefore they are not indexed nor ranked. Find all the orphan pages and link them to other relevant pages on your site. Google search engines will be able to crawl and list all the pages linked.
- c) Ensure that all the essential pages have links
Relevant pages are mostly ignored and don’t get any traffic. Evaluate all the crucial pages of your website and identify the ones that relate in content. Link these pages with useful links thus submit them for ranking.
d)Use relevant and definitive anchor texts
Have you been reading some information on a site and you encounter words in different colours? These are known as the anchor texts. They are phrases of words or relevant keywords used in place of links. Anchor text is best because they give a user an idea of what pages they will be visiting.
- e) Avoid several nofollow links on your pages
Nofollow links are the links used by several users on their websites. To help in avoiding problems with search engines if they are suspected to be selling any influences. Use the following link because it flows freely within the internal pages.
- f) Link contents deeply
Homepage and contact us pages on websites are the ones that have many links. It is advisable to link mostly the pages that have relevant content on the sites. Homepage already has their links, therefore creating more links will not be very helpful for ranking purposes. Ensure you link all the in-depth critical content.
- g) Links should always be natural
When you are adding links to link any pages of your site, make sure the link appears natural and flows with the content. Do not throw these links anywhere on the pages. Analyze the pages and find a strategic place to input the link.
- h) Too much of it is a penalty
Internal links are the source of ranking on google search engines. The more the link, the better the position on google. Too many links may also cause penalties. They tend to take away the comfort that comes with reading content. Several redirects create a poor user experience; thus, few will visit your website. Use a moderate number of links on your pages.
How to fix your existing internal links
You already have an operating website running efficiently. You have to carry out an audit on your website. To ensure that the users visiting your site will not have any terrible experiences with the errors that come up during navigation.
You can use three google analytics tools available on google for auditing your website for any broken links. You need to set up a period for evaluation on your account for the period you want to evaluate. Create filters by typing the name of your site. You will be redirected to a page with 404 error.
Update all the broken links and any redirected links giving errors. Create a report for all the links that were not resolved by using excel spreadsheets and adding all the unresolved links. Analyze all the data and decide on which links to delete permanently and if you will be creating new connections.
Strategy to use internal links to boost SEO
Internal linking juice is always a product of a good linking strategy put in place. The best strategies to use when using internal links to boost SEO are;
- Link from heavy paged contents
Create pages that are bulk in content. The content should be relevant to the theme of your websites. Use these substantial forms of content to link to each other. Make sure these articles are not just the quantity but have the quality to quench the users’ information thirst. Link these profoundly content to others since they will have several keywords that will be in the form of internal links.
- Anchor texts
Use of anchor text in your content are very colourful and user friendly. Anchor tets used should be descriptive. These texts should not be repetitive to avoid google penalties and poor user experience. Avoid any automated text such as click here. They make the user lose interest in your content. Do not link more than one sentence. It also makes it hard to read the content.
- Link new articles to several old pages
Websites contain several pages and posts from the day it was launched. Several people ignore the old post they created during the premiere of the sites and focus mostly on creating much new content. The old post, therefore, becomes less relevant and rarely get organic traffic. To ensure the equity of page authority and ranking throughout your whole website, link newly created posts to related old posts. Google will crawl on those links and rank them.
- Update old pages
Both the search engines and the website owners always ignore old pages. These posts rarely get much organic traffic because they are not indexed. To give them more authority, ensure you update the contents mostly on the first paragraphs and conclusion. Then add links to the news articles and submit them for ranking.
The step by step internal link guide
The creation of internal links as you have read it’s not complicated. It is the best practice one can carry out as an SEO marketing strategy for their websites. I will guide you through the steps of inputting the SEO internal links structure in your web pages.
Step 1:Search your own website on google console
Use the keywords to find the related posts or pages that are linked to your new page. It can be done by using your site’s features or googling your website.
The site features will enable you to identify pages you want to link from. You can go through the pages and find the relevant sections and map them down with a suitable anchor text.
Step 2: Research on the relevant keywords
Pull out all the keywords either from the heading alone or from the content too. Cognitive SEO’s Keyword Explorer is a useful tool for fetching keyword ideas. Google Keyword Planner is an option also. Find a keyword that will help to create a relevant anchor text to a particular page on your website.
Use google search optimization features to search for your website in considerations that your pages are indexed and ranked.
Step 3: Create a map for everything you need to use for internal linking
You will need an Excel file or google spreadsheets. In cases of power websites, you can split the mapping into several sheets. You need to have a clear structure of all your pages and all the relevant links you want to link from.
Step 4: Input the relevant links to the pages you want to redirect
Add links to newly created pages to redirect the necessary authority and traffic to the older pages. Use keywords to identify relevant content and then link from those articles to the news articles.
Step 5: Submit your pages to Google for ranking.
After each internal linking process, send your pages for ranking. It will enable google to identify any modifications created on the pages and understand your site. You can do this using the google search console in the crawl section.
All the best in your journey for a better SEO marketing strategy by improving your ranks and getting more traffic to your site.