Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Link flow for multiple links to same URL
-
Hi there,
my question is as follows:How does Google handle link flow if two links in a given page point to the same URL? (do they flow link individually or not?)
This seems to be a newbie question, but actually it seems that there is little evidence and even also little consensus in the SEO community about this detail.
- Answers should include source
- Information about the current state of art at Google is preferable
- The question is not about anchor text, general best practises for linking, "PageRank is dead" etc.
We do know that the "historical" PageRank was implemented (a long time ago) without special handling for multiple links, as e.g. last stated by Matt Cutts in this video: http://searchengineland.com/googles-matt-cutts-one-page-two-links-page-counted-first-link-192718
On the other hand, many people from the SEO community say that only the first link counts. But so far I could not find any data to back this up, which is quite surprising.
-
I totally agree on the focus thing in general - it's not helpful to act with PageRank in mind when it comes to layout decisions etc.
But: For large websites (e.g. 100,000 pages and up) crawl rate, indexing and rankings of deeper parts of the site depend heavily on the internal link graph. Taking a deeper look at the internal link graph gives us a lot of useful information in these cases, does it?
Now: Think of links sitting in a template that gets used on 50,000 pages. A little change here is likely to cause quite a difference in the internal link graph.
For example I've run PageRank simulations with both models on a smaller website with only 1,500 pages / 100,000 links. For many pages, the little difference ends up with 20-30% more or less internal PageRank - for these individual pages, this could be crucial for crawling, indexation and rankings. Still not useful?
Since moz runs it's own iterative PR like algorithms: How do you guys handle this with mozRank / mozTrust? Which model leads to better correlations with rankings?
-
- The links both get PageRank flow...
- The link value gets divided, though, so it wouldn't exactly double the value.
- The link extraction process might choose to only select one link from the page based on certain factors (perhaps ignoring some links not because they are duplicative but based on location, or other qualifiers)
Here is Matt Cutts talking about this very issue. And here again. It is the closest thing we have to an answer.
I think the reason for the "first link counts" is really an extension of an understanding of PageRank. Let's say a page has 1 outbound link. It gets 100% of the value passable by that page. Now, let's say the page adds another link, but it is the exact same link. Now, each link gets 50%. The sum total is 100%. It is as if the 2nd link were never added. But, this calculation changes depending on the other links on the page. Let's say a page has 2 links on it. One to you, one to someone else. 50/50. If you get another, you jump to 67/33. Slightly better. As the page increases in number of links, your additional link approaches a doubling of the first link's value. So on one end of the spectrum it is valueless. On the other end of the spectrum it doubles.
The other question is whether anchor text is counted for all links. Some experimentation indicates that only the 1st anchor text matters. This might also indicate the selection / extraction process mentioned in #2.
That all being said, I think I agree with Matt Cutts on this one. This is such a small issue that you really should focus on bigger picture stuff. It is interesting, yes, but not particularly useful.
I hope that helps!
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
-
Virtual URL Google not indexing?
Dear all, We have two URLs: The main URL which is crawled both by GSC and where Moz assigns our keywords is: https://andipaeditions.com/banksy/ The second one is called a virtual url by our developpers: https://andipaeditions.com/banksy/signedandunsignedprintsforsale/ This is currently not indexed by Google. We have been linking to the second URL and I am unable to see if this is passing juice/anything on to the main one /banksy/ Is it a canonical? The /banksy/ is the one that is being picked up in serps/by Moz and worry that the two similar URLs are splitting the signal. Should I redirect from the second to the first? Thank you
On-Page Optimization | | TAT1000 -
Should posts show in multiple categories?
Hi all, For context, I'm trying to Silo my content more efficiently. I've just moved all content into their own SILO'd categories and removed them from duplicate categories. As such, posts now sit only in 1 category. My question here is: Should my posts be showing in both the parent category and its sub category or just the sub-category? I've currently got this only showing in the sub-categories it's relevant to. For example:
On-Page Optimization | | xtrapsp
Post name: Shimano Fishing Rod Review
Parent Category: Fishing Rods
Sub Category: Shimano And the post only shows inside the Shimano Category0 -
Best Tool for Retrieving Multiple URL Word Counts in Bulk?
I am doing some content analysis with over 200 URLs to go through! Does anybody know of, or can recommend any bulk on-page word count checkers which would help with the heavy lifting? Any suggestions are greatly appreciated. Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | NickG-1230 -
Home page keyword in url
I have been looking into SEO for a few weeks now trying to perfect a homepage. Going through various sources on MOZ, and other examples out there on the internet, I keep seeing that you should have your keyword in the URL of the page. The homepage is the page most people want to rank the highest in google searches, however, you cannot put the keyword in the URL as most home page URLs are simply /. Should I actually make the home like this: www.example.com/key-word-example? I would imagine this would not be the normal for many users and would seem like it's not the home page.
On-Page Optimization | | Matthew_smart0 -
Link in H1 tag?
Hi guys, We're working through a redesign of our product page and are considering the following: http://screencast.com/t/NBSsDGA9vgS3 Currently the product name (including the brand name - Arc'teryx) in this case is included in the H1 and none of the title is linked. You can see this here: http://www.evo.com/synthetic-jackets/arcteryx-atom-lt-hoodie-womens.aspx The firm we're working with is proposing keeping the entire title in the H1 but linking the brand name to the entire brand assortment. My concern is that the brand name is a critical part of the product title and should be text (not a link). Any suggestions? Thanks!
On-Page Optimization | | evoNick
Will0 -
What is on page links?
Hi - i would like to know exactly what an on page link is? i understand the linking system however cant work what exactly what an on page link is? Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | OasisLandDevelopment0 -
How long is too long for domain URL length?
I noticed one of the negatively correlated ranking factors was length of URL. I'm building a page from scratch, we are trying to rank for 'Minneapolis Fitness' and 'Minneapolis Massage'. Is www.minnnepolismassageandfitness.com just ridiculously long? Or does the exact match outweigh the penalty for URL length?
On-Page Optimization | | JesseCWalker2 -
Prevent link juice to flow on low-value pages
Hello there! Most of the websites have links to low-value pages in their main navigation (header or footer)... thus, available through every other pages. I especially think about "Conditions of Use" or "Privacy Notice" pages, which have no value for SEO. What I would like, is to prevent link juice to flow into those pages... but still keep the links for visitors. What is the best way to achieve this? Put a rel="nofollow" attribute on those links? Put a "robots" meta tag containing "noindex,nofollow" on those pages? Put a "Disallow" for those pages in a "robots.txt" file? Use efficient Javascript links? (that crawlers won't be able to follow)
On-Page Optimization | | jonigunneweg0