When criteria do you use for external linking?

[Charlessipe]

When linking out to external sources what criteria do you use? Also, do you ever add the URL in plain text instead to conserve link juice?

[Matt-Williamson]

I link out to other sources frequently too - I work on this principle - will linking to another site enrich this information for the person reading it. Linking to others sites when appropriate is only natural for building a great online resource, which I think is what we all want, that is why we spend time creating great content and marketing our sites online, working on optimization strategies etc. Whether you are selling products, services or blogging creating a site that is a rich resource with great content should always be your aim as this will lead to increases in all aspects, so don't be afraid to add links to other sites if you think it would help the visitor to your site - a website with a link profile that does this looks the most natural..

[EGOL]

I link out a lot.  Every page that I link to is better than my own site in some way.  I don't worry about linking out and have zero hesitation to linking to six, eight, ten great sources of info on a single page.

[Sean_Dawes]

External linking is fine and often times good. If you think about it, how natural is just solely having you link to your own content? Not so natural.  Link to good sources and good sources will link to you.

Now the key is to not go crazy and link to multiple sites in a single page without giving yourself any love.

If they are blog posts, I think it is good to link out. Now if it was a product page on an online store, not so much.

[Matthew_Edgar]

I am pretty picky about linking out to other websites and rarely have an external link more than once per page unless it makes complete sense to have the multiple external links on that one page. That said, it does depend on the site and the page. If it is a blog, I'm more generous with external links. Still though, with any external links I make sure it is a site I'm willing to link to (good authority, good fit for users, etc.).

Given that I'm only linking out to trustworthy sites, I usually don't add in a rel nofollow. On the few occasions I've had to link to a site that is questionable, I'll always nofollow that link.

On your question of the <a>tag...when I do link out, I do always put it in a regular link just so that I don't make the website harder to use. I've tried the plain text route before and didn't see any huge SEO impacts but did see a huge negative usability impact.</a>

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