Links
-
Hi, im wondering if links that is not exact anchor links gives any boost for rankings?
Example if lets say somebody links to my site http://domain.com/category/article with anchor: domainname or url link.
-
Hey Paddy,
Great summary man!
Your 1,2, 3 = There are lots of other signals as well which Google can look at besides anchor text.
Overall site health is essential
All the best,
Tom
-
Hi Rob,
There are some great answers in this thread, so I won't repeat too much. But just a few additional points:
- Ultimately, the quality of the site should be an important factor for you to consider. If the site is high quality, then it's likely to help you in terms of traffic and rankings no matter what the anchor text is.
- Anchor text still plays a big part in rankings. But as others have said, it can be risky to have too much anchor text which doesn't look natural i.e. is stuffed full of keywords. So you do need to be careful not to look manipulative and I'd advise not taking risks and focusing on the quality of the link as noted above.
- There are lots of other signals as well which Google can look at besides anchor text. A few may be - the position of the link on the page, the surrounding text, whether the link is in a list or not, whether the link is followed or not.. countless things which can help Google decide if a link is good or not.
I hope that helps!
Paddy
-
Just in case all these excellent answers are not compounding enough I want to let you know I concur with everyone.
Today you want to be careful of using anchor text. I'm not going to lie and tell you that it is a more potent however the best way to do it is naturally most people will not give you incredible anchor text when linking to you if it's done naturally.
It's fine to get a lot of "click here" check out the site" for site's name or the URL. Also, Google is not stupid they have an excellent idea of rather not it's a little bit over optimized and may be a buddy helped hypothetically let's say you sell tennis shoes For clay courts. "Clay-court tennis shoes" looks like it would fine only If rarely done and people will do that on their own so don't do it yourself.
Backlinks and anchor text are still a way to get you removed from the SERPS by Google, but if it is over optimized, it's so easy to tell that you have manipulated the links.
Put it this way Google looks at every link with its AI machine learning algorithm it knows what normal is and what normal is not. You will always get some very optimized URLs and its natural.
One rule I have with Google if you think it's possibly going to be an issue then stay away from it or do what you did here and got good information.
** excellent references on Natural Anchor Text vs Unnatural Anchor Text**
- https://www.semrush.com/blog/8-signs-that-indicate-youre-over-optimizing-your-blog/
- https://moz.com/blog/anchor-text-distribution-avoiding-over-optimization
- http://www.wordstream.com/anchor-text
- https://blog.kissmetrics.com/avoid-over-optimizing/
- https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/66356?hl=en
What you have to deal with if you do not pay attention to what Google tells you to do.
Tools For checking your back links.
- https://moz.com/researchtools/ose/
- https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home?hl=en
- https://ahrefs.com/
- https://majestic.com
Tools for checking your external links on your site:
- https://moz.com/researchtools/crawl-test
- https://www.deepcrawl.com/index-of-reports/
- https://analytics.moz.com/manage-campaigns
- https://www.screamingfrog.co.uk/seo-spider/
** I hope that this helps and you have avoided some issues with Google.**
** All the best,**
** Tom **
-
Hi Rob.
Long story, short? Yes, they do impact possitevely in your SERPS.
I agree with Bas.
My personal advise: mantein the diversity in every aspect. Google is able to find out whether you are trying to manipulate the SERPs. And ALWAYS, think the linkbuilding strategy as making it look natural and organic.Hope it helps.
GR. -
Well: like i said: it's better to have 'natural anchors'. So, yes, you can score with a different anchor text.
Say for example: you wouldn't tell anyone to which page they would have to link to and what anchor or IF they need to use an anchor text. In this case: the inlinks and anchor texts would probably be very 'natural'. Meaning: all different.
In that you will very probably gain DA or PA with these inlinks.
It's not only the anchor text, or the source URL, or the relevancy of the content of the linking domain to your domain: it's all these and much more combined. The anchor text is only a part of the complete 'calculation'.
To come back to your question if such a link will give you a boost: there is a high probability that it will, no matter what the anchor text is. Since the site that is linking to you is about a similar topic, i would expect a positive effect. Whether you can measure the effect or not depends on a lot of other elements that we (in this forum) don't know.
Of course: a link with an anchor text containing the keyword that you chose to the page you've chosen would be perfect. But that doesn't mean all other combinations are useless. Maybe less effective towards to your personal or business goal. That might be the case.
Does this help you?
Bas -
Thanks for the answer, i understand that. But i wonder if it will give any boost in rankings if lets say somebody links to me from his blog that is about fruits and the article is about apples. The anchor text is my domain name or my URL and it links to my site with this url: http://domain.com/fruit/apple.
Will it give any boost at all or is it only when the right anchor is used?
-
Hi: best to have natural anchor texts. Rand said in one of the Whiteboard Friday videos that it's better to not have all anchor texts the same. That's not natural. Have some variation in anchor texts.
As long as the anchor texts resemble the content and your chosen keyword(s), the anchor text will still push you in the right direction.
Hope that helps.
Bas
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Internal links: How do I find keywords that are not linked to a URL?
Hi Moz members I'd really like to place an internal link of every instance of an important keyword phrase "cycling caps" or "cycling cap" to my eComm category page
Link Building | | andystorey
https://www.prendas.co.uk/collections/headwear/cotton-caps I feel this would not only help my customers browsing my store, but I believe it will help from an SEO perspective. How can I search my site using Moz, Screaming Frog, Google etc to find every time cycling cap(s) is used but is not linked to the above URL? I can then apply the same for cycling jerseys, socks, etc Andy0 -
Tracking New Links
Hello, We are looking for tools to be able to track new links to one of our pages. I've explored OSE, Google Search Console, ahrefs, and Majestic. I've noticed that there is a delay in which new links are found; that not all the links are reported; and that many of these tools do not provide info on which links are new (vs. old). Are there certain tools you recommend over others to track new links as they come in? Any insights or best practices on link building tracking would also be much appreciated. Many thanks!
Link Building | | CuriosityMedia0 -
Spammy Links in MOZ but when I go to the external link I can't find a link to us
I was going to try to contact webmasters to see if they would remove some of our spammy links. I see alot of them in MOZ but when you go to the site our anchor text is not there. Is this good? How often does MOZ refresh external links. Please see: http://www.opensiteexplorer.org/anchors?site=www.totalvac.com None of the links for the anchor text <a class="clickable title link-pivot" title="See top linking pages that use this anchor text." data-text="vacuum cleaner parts vacuum parts vacuum bags vacuum cleaner bags" data-id="46391436859">vacuum cleaner parts vacuum part...</a> in MOZ exist? We got hit extremely hard by Penguin in May
Link Building | | totalvac0 -
No inbound links ?
Hello I just got SeoMoz, started the whole thing and compared myself to my competitor. I'm writing for mayor national newspapers in latin america, been featured a few major sites, and got a whole lot of links directing to muy site. I recently moved domains about a month ago from rxmagaizne.mx to rxmagazine.co. Is this the reason i'm not seeing any links ? ibIPY.png
Link Building | | timi-do0 -
What are the pros and cons of using a link builder? Can link building be outsourced?
Hi, I have great content on my website which I would like to build external links to from other websites. I am told this will increase my domain authority and ultimately help search engine ranking positions. I have very limited time in my hands and now thinking of outsourcing the link building component to a specialist. Is this a good way of doing it? Could you recommend professional link builders?
Link Building | | Saunders18650 -
How many links per week is too fast in link building?
For a new website/blog how many links per week looks suspicious or hurt the rankings?
Link Building | | aaran1 -
If I write a PR release on a site such as PRweb with anchor-text links that is picked up and published by other news sites, do the engines consider this duplicate content or additional, beneficial links?
I recently wrote a news release on PRweb that was picked up identically by 8 other news websites, with the same anchor-text links as the original. Is the reproduction of duplicate content and links across different websites like this to the benefit or detriment of SEO and ranking power? Some of the links are: http://www.mynewsdesk.com/uk/view/pressrelease/eventa-new-eventa-christmas-parties-website-is-launched-648923?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=Alert&utm_content=pressrelease http://www.prweb.com/releases/christmasparties/neweventasite/prweb8562064.htm Many thanks!!
Link Building | | RobertHill0 -
Linking for multiple clients
We own a small web design company that both creates the sites and then does the seo marketing for them once they are created. The business has grown to have over 100 customers. However, as we sell more sites we find our SEO team is somewhat short staffed. So far, the area that suffers the most is the link building aspect of SEO. The sites we build are for dentists and usually only contain 10 to 20 pages. Enough to list the services they offer and where they are located. Here is my question: We need to get the most effective links possible for over 100 sites with just a couple of employees. What would be the most effective links to try for. We cant chase down every stray link for our doctors. And, we don't have time to do in-depth research for each client each month as we are already pushing ourselves to the limit. In time, we will have more employees to help share the SEO load. But for now, where should we be spending our time most effectively? We can usually only budget one or two hours per client each month for linking. Thanks for any advice you can offer.
Link Building | | Alex_Ratynski0