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For your content to rank on Google search engine pages, you must incorporate internal link building strategy. Most brands, writers, and publishers worry about the search engine rankings of content on their website pages which can be due to poor linking of the domain
You can establish a website with full authority and credibility just by linking pages on your site with valuable content. That way users tend to stay longer on your website by navigating seamlessly from one page to the other in search of what interest them.
For example, if you have a website for products or services, you can add internal links to other pages on the same website from your home page such as blog content, product pages with pricing and product descriptions, landing pages, etc. Users can follow easily to discover more about your services before they can take the necessary steps. This article will highlight the importance of internal linking and the strategic approach to building an effective link, also brands and content creators will understand how to leverage linking to boost SEO.
Table of Contents
What is Internal Linking?
This is a strategy that involves incorporating any link from one domain page to another. It can also be a tool for adding resources via links to your content from one website page to another, which is specifically known as contextual links.
Internal links are necessary for building a structure that enhances efficient user experience and increases page ranks.
Internal and External Links
Internal links are links that direct a user from one page to another on the same website. They are hyperlinks on a domain page that points out resources such as images, videos, documents or audio content on the same page.
External links are links that help users navigate from one website page to another website page. Note, that the difference between these external links from another website page is either connected to your page or from your page. This former process is backlinks while the latter is outbound links, for example, a brand’s website product line for footwear may refer links to and from an e-commerce marketplace such as Shopify, Amazon, etc. This can create authority for the domain page and boost credibility.
What is the Importance of Internal Linking?
Linked page to your website can add significant value to your page for search engine crawlers and discover your page easily. This is what most brands crave, because it guides your visitors and Google to your important pages, just to create brand awareness and increase engagement through traffic. The importance of internal link building can’t be overemphasized:
It helps Search Engine Find Your Content
Contents on the web are gigantic and can become complex, rendering contents without internal links helpless and buried. This can cause an issue to your website if it contains no link because Googlebot cant index or find your page on search engines.
This is why internal links help search engine spiders crawl your web page in order to boost the authority of the site., it also helps to understand the internal linking structure of your website.
It Adds to Link Value
The quality and how many internal links are added to a domain determines the link value of that page. Because Google sees a page with many valuable links as an important and credible page for ranking purposes. This link value is shared between all the links found on the homepage of the site. A great example is linking a blog post to a homepage instead of a category page for search engines to notice recent content created.
Internal Link Help Search Engines Understand Your Website Structure
Creating internal links will help Google understand the relationship between your blog posts and the hierarchy between the pages on your site. This is because it gives relevance to your page when you craft a similar topic inside each content to boost the page for SEO purposes.
It Creates an Atmosphere for Engagement
The key to any marketing success is to drive traffic through your content. Some websites use relevant internal link within the content that links to another related piece. It doesn’t only increase engagement, it also adds value to content giving users the platform to research deeper into the topic and acquire more information through the links provided.
It Sustains Your Content from Been Buried
Broken internal links can cause your content to be buried and forgotten as search engines won’t index your webpage, also, if your content doesn’t receive enough relevant links it can be forgotten and won’t rank on search engine pages. Internal pages with Nofollow links are prone to be buried, however, you need to convert them to a DoFollow link for easy navigation and ranking opportunity.
It Increases Dwell Time and Reduces the Bounce Rate
Some search engine ranking factors can influence can be improved by adding an internal link. These factors are the Bounce rate and RankBrain-Both can be increased by providing content that users will want to click to stay more on your website. The more time they spend on your website the more your bounce rate increases.
Also, the percentage of people that click on a result page can increase the chance of page visibility, this encourages SEO response by increased page view and time session.
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How To Find Internal Links in a Website
Use Google Console
You can learn which pages receive the most relevance and clicks, and also check what queries drive traffic. Also, you can access SEO performance in a dashboard that monitors the performance metrics. A list of metrics to consider with Google search console are:
- Which domain page generates more engagements and clicks in SERPs?
- What is your website page’s average click-through rate (CTR) in search engines?
- Which queries drive more traffic?
- How many clicks does your website generate per month?
- What is the average positioning of your page on search results?
This will help you gain experience in monitoring organic search performance. You can easily set up Google Search Console dashboard by following these steps;
- Get a suitable template
- In the menu bar select links
- Then insert the website’s link, then you are able to see all page link to your page
Check the Internal backlink on Ahrefs
This can be done simply by inserting your domain link in the site explorer, Then the next step is to click on the internal backlink to see through all the pages referring to your domain. For example using an anchor text with a variation of target keywords such as “ How to bake cake”, clicking through will guide you through different pages and take you to a page on the website explaining the context further.
Best Internal Linking Practices For SEO
We now can see the benefit internal linking does to our content or website pages. Furthermore, there are best routine strategies for link building any industry can take up for successful ranking on search engine. Most brands employ link building services of experts to help them incorporate these links and strategies to boost engagement and drive traffic. These strategies include:
Create Lots of Content
There is absolutely nothing to link to your website if you don’t create content. And it’s not just creating content but crafting high-quality content for a specific audience to connect. You need to create a lot of content to be able to insert internal link that will rank on the search page.
Link High Authority Domain to Improve Rankings
This is necessary to distribute authority to most SEO-driven pages, tools like Ahrefs are used to insert links and boost your chances of visibility. It is inefficient to have many internal link without relevance or authority, You can simply rank on a Google page with a couple of powerful pages.
Use Anchor-Text on Images
Simply use text that contains alt tags and is written properly to describe the content of the image if necessary. You can use natural and unoptimized sentence fragments to link anchor text to avoid spam.
Use contextual Link
This is the core element in internal link building because users are able to gain insight into what they are searching for with the right clicks for an effective user experience. Google primary SEO purpose is to rank for content that provides and solves the user’s pain point. The user is able to find more to read due to the Linking done on your website.
Don’t Over-use Internal links
Too many links on your page can dilute the content according to Google’s John Mueller. He further explains that it could lead to the problem of structure which is the base of SEO. There is no specific number of links to apply on your website, however, the length of your content a range of 3-5 internal links spread evenly is enough for an article to rank.
Put links Higher on your Page
Most times when Google index a page it starts from the start of the page. It is advisable to apply this internal linking strategy to your link building technique. Also, people will stumble on what interests them and click to get more information keeping them looking deep into your site while they depend on time.
Avoid Creating Sitewide Footer Links
These are obsolete practices used as an internal linking strategy. These footer links can hit algorithm penalty in SEO because Google deems them spam and doesn’t crawls the content
Conclusion
It is easy to start up internal link building for your website, you just have to follow the best strategies for success. Internal linking is a common trend in content marketing and brands implement them to create awareness and build authority. Following these trends consistently will enable you to rank on the search engine result page.
