Internal Linking Boosts SEO and Engages Readers
There are hundreds of thousands of unique procedures to keep websites in the public eye. Only a selected few are powerful enough to leave a bigger impact. Link Building is one such exceptionally appealing procedure that makes a big difference when it comes to boosting the SEO of websites to attain the desired success. What makes it so important today? It has already been considered one of the most genuine and sure-shot factors to improving website rankings thus the resultant improvement in traffic is unbound.
When planning a workable and strategically ingenious SEO strategy, you should add many factors and apply them in one go. Apart from generating high-quality backlinks, you can equally consider the enriched role of internal linking strategies for the said purpose. It is potential enough to support SEO efforts greatly and thus improve rankings in the manifold. Henceforth, you witness the resultant outcome of the best conversions.
That is why webmasters are advised not to overlook or devalue the power of Link Building while planning SEO strategies. It is a must to focus on multiple things but always emphasize the one that actually brings greater impact.
Backlinks are the links to a website from other web pages of another domain that had no links earlier. There are countless benefits of backlinks that should be understood to avail of the features they offer. Some of their notable advantages include improving website ranking, building your brand authority, brand name exposure & recognition and etc. al. While creating internal links, you should use quality anchor text and build links that search engines can crawl easily to ascertain your easy noticing by them.
Related: Content Marketing Strategies to Boost SEO
What is an Internal Link?
Internal links are the links that go from one page to the other as an entirely different webpage on the same domain but remain connected for the variegated benefits. Such links are mainly used for navigation purposes, therefore, you have facilitated SEO and reader engagement by taking such unique steps. In other terms, internal linking refers to any of the links from one webpage on a domain to another webpage on that particular domain for their mutual popularity and benefit.
What is an External Link?
External links are the links that go from one page to the other on another domain but carry equal benefit potentiality. It may be from your website to another or another to your website and vice versa. It depends on uses and theme and is important for your referral traffic, authority and SEO. Thus, you can’t ignore it at any level.
Four Main Uses of Internal Links Include:
- Let the users navigate a website
- Let them establish an information hierarchy for the given website
- Let it spread link juice
- Let there be an improvement in the ranking
Benefits of Internal Linking
1. Improves Usability Through Anchor Texts
While interlinking, you must use anchor texts meticulously after careful assessment to obtain the desired result. Proper internal linking helps users to navigate throughout your website. While using anchor texts, you should always maintain relevancy. It is an important factor in this SEO strategy. If you ignore it then you should be prepared for the worst consequences. Undoubtedly, you will increase the bounce rate due to carelessness. Such blunders are not good for the overall health of your website thus you must remain careful in your approach.
2. Spread the Link Juice
It must be remembered that both internal, as well as external links, play a greater role to ensure the ranking of specific websites in the SEO industry. Undoubtedly, all external links you focus on are the ones that usually prove helpful for you to get authority from external sources. You attain empowerment by doing so. On the other hand, internal links also assist you to pass the link juice to other pages within your site to increase the level of benefit you believed to gain through such a medium for popularity.
3. Improve Page Views
Always remember this fact that through proper keyword and anchor text research you are on the verge of availing yourself the manifold advantage. The most important benefit which you avail through it is that you are in a position to find the useful and related content on the website thus there occurs tremendous improvement in page views. Link generating content also increases traffic and ranking to increase views.
Once views increase, you start fulfilling the target and therefore avail the benefit of maximum reachability to countless people in one go. In this scenario, you increase the chance of conversions when your viewers become your potential customers. Obviously, an increased page view will start boosting your Alexa rank.
4. Reduces Bounce Rate
When your pages are interlinked, you increase the chance of potential visitors spending some quality time while reading your posts. In addition, they can easily move from one post to the other through such an arrangement of yours. It not only reduces your bounce rate but also improves the chance of conversions. That is how you avail one more benefit.
5. Builds strong website architecture
The way your website is structured and built can be enhanced with the effective utilization of internal links. Interlinking the main page with sub-pages at the 2nd, 3rd level, and so on respectively ensures that the on-page SEO and architecture of your website becomes strong enough to fulfill the purpose for which it was created.
6. Enhances Google crawling
Crawlers are used by Google or any search engine to navigate your website and get all available information based on which your website can be ranked/indexed. Suppose you have utilized a strategic technique of internal linking. In that case, the crawlers will identify important content from your website and assure that more in-depth pages on your website appear on the search results.
7. Improves the ranking of older blogs/articles/posts
Are you worried that the old posts on your website are failing to get traffic? Do not worry because internal links will help your case. If you link your new posts with a relevant old post, then the users will also visit the old page for information. Through internal linking, older content on your website may be useful and appropriate for the users to get a better ranking on the search engines.
For our Readers: New Ways To Refresh your Old Blogs
8. Augments long-tail keywords
Descriptive and long phases used as keywords are searched more by the users and have a high conversion rate than words or 2-3 word phrases. Internal links and link anchors usually use such long-tail keywords, allowing your web page/content to rank better. However, utilizing diversified and long-tail keywords as link anchors would be a successful SEO content strategy.
Know more about our SEO Content Writing Services in India
9. Click-through rate is enhanced
A metric that measures how many times a search result was clicked about how many times the result appeared on the search engine is termed as click-through rate (CTR). It is witnessed that the CTR is enhanced due to internal linking because search engines can better associate the website content with the queries/keywords from the users. Remember, an improved CTR leads to a better ranking of your website as well.
10. Prevents keyword cannibalization
Sometimes, search engines cannot identify which content/webpage of yours to rank higher and ends up prioritizing content that you did not want to prioritize in rankings. It is because of several similar and identical keywords used in your content. The whole phenomenon is known as keyword cannibalization. Internal linking helps curb this phenomenon, ensuring that the search engine can identify content that you want to prioritize.
11. Context and Hierarchy in Order
Keeping all the technical and deep-dive content on the first or second-level website page doesn’t top the priority list. Prioritizing top-level focus against being multiple clicks deep, following content organized by you around topics. Like in the old SEO days, there was no need to have a single page per keyword. We can broaden our thoughts in terms almost similar to a term paper outline. Have you ever pondered what allows us to develop topics and topics-within-topics on your site? The answer narrows down to naturally structuring your content from high-level to specifics.
It has the impact that ultimately leads to ranking on anything from broad top-level crawling down to unanticipated long-tail keywords for the contents that are specific and detailed.
A user and the search engine need to get the hierarchy of the content in proper order. If you want to gain topical relevance, then you will have to ensure that your content is well organized and logical to navigate.
Here lies the biggest challenge you may, in all likelihood, face. That is the notion of stakeholders in your organization or within your client’s organization that everything has its importance and needs to be on the home page or in the top navigation.
12. Let the Link Value Flow
Never take off your link building hat when links get set to be directed to the site from high-quality external sources. You should take it the same way and know that just in a similar fashion, link value passes from one page to another within your website, strictly based on the same logic.
There was a time when there was a clearer picture of Google PageRank, which helped you assess the value each of the pages on your site has, enabling a great deal to manage your linking structure to push PageRank into areas you cared about most.
Today, we live in an era where the rise of PageRank sculpting is nowhere to be seen, and now, we can’t see PR scores at all. Relying on the SEO tool-specific page and domain quality metrics is the most favoured option before the businesses. Still, it is critical to know where inbound links from other sources land on your site, and so is the site structure to ensure that the value of your landing page is not diluted.
Furthermore, you have all the advantages of concentrating link value to flow to the pages that appear of utmost importance to you, following streamlined navigation and not proliferating dozens of links on every page. It can behave either by spreading it around to top-level topic pages or down into a silo of content on a particular topic. One thing must be ensured: the alignment of your content with your link building, it’s structuring, and indeed the destination where you want to send significant link value.
Final Say – Internal Linking
Undoubtedly, interlinking is a great way to improve ranking, traffic, and conversions. It is worth noting that benefits are unparalleled, but you should do the interlinking professionally to avail benefits to the best extent possible. Black Hat SEO activities such as link farming or keyword cannibalization might harm your website than it prove good for SEO. That is why it is always appreciable to receive help from professional webmasters. Professionals will definitely help you from the initial stage until all those stages where you seek timely support. They make an extensive plan from keyword research to the stages of finalizing anchor texts for internal linking and beyond.
Getting your digital marketing task done professionally means the half result you sought is already achieved. Google crawlers give priority to those websites which can maintain such levels of technical accuracy. Even little efforts with meticulous planning are bound to help you attain a wonderful result.
Please do share your experience regarding internal as well as external link building.
