Internal Linking for SEO: Essential Techniques to Use

We have seen lots of SEO articles and blogs surfing on internet about on-page SEO, off-page SEO, technical SEO, content marketing, and a lot more. Deep diving into each topic can still have various contexts to discover. This guide will talk about the internal linking for SEO and best practices involved.

These links are hyperlinks that can be seen on any every type of content – be it blog, eBook or web page. Attaining a great significance in SEO, internal linking has become one crucial aspect in content marketing.

Let’s go further to know about them and how we can utilize internal linking for SEO purposes.

What is internal linking?

The process of hyperlinking a certain phrase or text in the content is called internal linking. This link added to the text navigates the user to another page within the same website. This process aims to help users understand the references related to the hyperlinks and keep them engaged within the same domain.

Internal linking also helps to structure the website along the hierarchy (from homepage to other sub-pages). Ideally, each page on your website should be accessed within three clicks.

Internal linking is one of the SEO basics as they help communicate to web crawlers what pages are the most important, next important, and least important on your website. It can be done in many ways – hyperlinking anchor texts, clickable images, using CTA (call to actions) or buttons.

Internal linking for SEO is a crucial part of your strategy while creating search-friendly content. It helps search engines to crawl the links, visit pages and understand their reference with the website or the particular page.

Types of Internal Links in SEO

There are different types of internal links in SEO, each come with its own characteristic. These links play a crucial role in structuring the website architecture. Let’s know their usage:

1- Navigational links

Navigation links help users to go from one page to another within the website. They make way for surfing the website, making the connection between web pages clear and seamless.

In most of the cases, navigational links can be seen in the menu bar of a website (at the top of the page). They are well-placed to reflect smooth architecture of the website, giving a clear idea about the main pages and their sub-pages.

2- Contextual links

Contextual links works the same as navigational links but they are used within the content, such as web pages, blogs, newsletters, etc. They help users to understand the reference of a specific term or text which is hyperlinked to the targeted page.

For instance, if you need to hyperlink the page ‘https://xyz.com/product-name’ then you can directly apply this link address to the text mentioning ‘product name’ in the content. So, whenever the readers come to this text and want to know about it more then they can simply click it to jump on the targeted page.

However, avoid hyperlinking the same text or term with the same targeted page multiple times. It can affect the overall readability of the content, and search engine crawlers might consider it a spam.

Breadcrumb links are used to show the journey of users navigating from one page to others. These links usually visible on the top left corner of the page, starting from the page on which the user first visited, followed by the other pages in the sequence.

For example:

Breadcrumbs are important in internal linking for SEO as they highlight the relationship of each page with the root domain and sub-domain pages. Moreover, users can also easily jump from current content to previous one using these internal links.

4- Footer links

Footer links appear in the footers of a webpage. They are hyperlinks to the important pages of the website such as Contact Us, Blog, Privacy Terms, About Us, etc. These internal links are very useful for users who want to know more about a website.

Suppose your visitors scroll down to the bottom of the page and you have a great internal linking structure in the footer, showcasing your most prioritized pages linked to the targeted page. As a result, you will get a huge benefit in terms of reduced bounce rate, increased engagement, and higher chances of conversion.

Importance of Internal Linking for SEO

Internal linking has a vast role play in SEO. As we mentioned above that they help search engines as well as users to understand the connection between pages within the same domain, there are other important reasons.

1. Internal Linking Helps in Crawling & Indexing

Internal linking in SEO helps search engine crawlers to visit the pages hyperlinked on their respective terms or phrases within the website. Once these crawlers visit these pages, users will be able to find their content more easily.

The safest way to make crawlers visit your pages is to hyperlink the texts in the content. So, whenever they come across your content, they follow internal links to discover new pages and index them.

Both crawling and indexing boost the chances of gaining visibility on your content. Every time a user hits the query related to your web page or blog, search engines will show them on SERPs (once they are indexed).

2. Enhanced Website’s Navigation Structure

Internal linking in the website enrich the navigational journey of the search engines and users. They add value to the web pages hyperlinked in the content, providing a reference of their relationship with each other.

When done correctly, users visiting your website will spend more time on your content. They will find ways to know about your products, services, policies, resources, and a lot more. As a result, you will provide a quality experience and enhancing the engagement rate for higher conversions.

3. Boosts Link Juice

A huge benefit of doing internal linking for SEO is that you build and distribute authority of the pages linked with each other through content. This process is generally known as passing the ‘Link Juice’. It helps to gain authority from most visited pages to the new ones listed on the same website.

You just need to simply hyperlink the new or less-performing web pages in the top performing pages through a text. Because, top performing pages will be getting a good amount of organic traffic through backlinks, listings or rankings. And hence, you can divert some users to the less-performing or new pages easily.

Best practices to internal linking for SEO

Now that you why internal linking for SEO is important for your website, let’s talk about the best practices to do so. Without knowing the right ways, you can’t leverage the process and its benefits.

1. Begin from Topic Clusters and Pillar Pages

Pillar content is used for creating long-form marketing copies. They aim to elaborate broader topics with in-depth information. Since there are so many to tell through pillar pages, you can easily find the scopes for internal linking.

In addition, you can utilize topics clustering to follow internal linking practice. In simple words, you can have multiple topics and their sub-topics, increasing the chances to insert internal links in each content related to each other.

For instance, consider there is a blog on the topic ‘A Complete Guide to SEO’ that further has blogs on sub-topics like ‘On-page SEO Guide’, ‘Off-page SEO Guide’, etc. Now you can easily add internal links of the sub-topics in the content written in the main topic.

This is because, on-page SEO and off-page SEO are both parts of the main topic. So, you will get the opportunity to hyperlink the texts with their respective blogs.

Likewise, you can create more topic clusters to increase the possibilities of internal linking for SEO.

2. Choose the Right Anchor Text

Anchor text is a particular phrase or term on which hyperlinks can be inserted as an internal linking strategy for SEO. These texts get a unique importance when linked with other pages. You just need to meaningfully add texts and then apply links to them without affecting the readability or quality of the content.

Another best way to utilize anchor texts is to use primary keywords of the targeted pages. It will be easy to hyperlink them and they will reflect a higher relevancy for the users as well as search engines. This practice always works while internal linking for SEO goals and purposes.

Doing so will help your readers as well as search engines to determine what reference you have given and how it is related to the targeted page. Anchor texts also helps to enhance relevancy of internal links on the chosen texts. Google sees them as a way to understand website’s internal linking structure.

3. Prioritize Important Links

There are certain pages and blogs which you need to show first to your potential visitors. You need to prioritize them for internal linking and place them on top of the pages. This will increase their visibility through more organic clicks and traffic.

Moreover, most readers go from top to bottom while fetching information from a page or a blog. Finding internal links in the beginning of the content help to navigate readers to the prioritized pages.

Your potential audience will also get the relevant information on top of the content while helping them to understand the topic-wise hierarchy of the pages. This process also helps search engine to understand the signals obtained through this internal linking strategy.

4. Choose High Authority Pages for Internal Linking

High authority pages have higher traffic and engagement rate due to great content and high-quality backlinks. Moreover, users visiting these pages consistently seek relevancy and interest in your content. Hence, you can leverage these pages to pass some authority to non-performing or new pages.

Just find these pages, optimize the content a bit to add anchor texts and hyperlink them to targeted pages. Better enough if there are phrases or keywords (similar to targeted pages) already placed in the content.

Make sure you don’t forcefully add texts or phrases to hyperlink the pages as it might affect their ranking or overall performance on SERPs.

5. Don’t Use Link Stuffing

Strategically implementing internal links is the most appropriate way. Not following so might deviate your potential visitors from one context to another, resulting in poor experience and increased bounce rate of the existing and new pages.

Even if you see phrases or keywords that can be linked to low-authority pages, but they are not syncing with the context on the existing page, avoid internal linking.

However, you can do so at the bottom of the page (only if relevant). It will avoid affecting your website’s overall internal linking structure.

Following these practices will help you in internal linking for SEO while maintaining the website’s core architecture accurately. You want your visitors to get value through your content, and internal linking is the right way.

eSearch Logix’s Approach to Internal Link Building

In terms of SEO and content marketing, internal linking is a very helpful and natural tool. By utilizing it appropriately, you not just experience an increase in visibility of your website but also a consistent balance between user experience and SEO.

Our experts at eSearch Logix follows the same pattern to drive internal linking for SEO. They construct SEO and content marketing strategies to utilize website’s architecture from initial pages to secondary ones.

We have successfully enhanced thousands of websites from global clients with our own customized strategies. Our expertise isn’t restricted to just content but a diverse range of SEO services, which include:

Whether you have just entered the world of content marketing and SEO or need to optimize your existing website’s linking structure, we’re have the right tools and expertise to nurture your visibility and rankings.

Internal Linking for SEO: Must-follow Strategies to Implement

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What is internal linking?