Best anchor text strategy for embeddable content

[benseb]

Hi all

We provide online services, and as part of this we provide our clients with a javascript embeddable 'widget' to place on their website. This is fairyly popular (100s-1000s of inserts on websites).

The main workings of this are javascript (they spit html iframe onto the page) but we also include both a

<noscript>portion (which is purely customer focused, it deep links into a relevant page on our website for the user to follow)  and also a plain <p><a href=''></a></p> at the bottom, under the JS. This is all generated and inserted by the website owner. Therefore, after insertion we can dynamically update whatever the Javascript renders out, but the <noscript> and <a> at the bottom are there forever.</p> <p>Previously, this last plain link has been used for optimisation, with it randomly selecting 1 out of a bank of 3 different link anchor texts when the widget html is first generated.</p> <p>We've also recently split our website into B2B and B2C portions, so this will be linking to a newer domain with much established backlinks than the existing domain. I think we could get away with optimised keyword links on the old domain but the newer domain they will be more obvious.</p> <p>In light of recent G updates, we're afraid this may look spammy. We obviously want to utilise the link as best as possible, as it is used by hundreds of our clients, but don't want it to cause any issues. </p> <p>So my question, would you just focus on using brand name anchor text for this? Or could we mix it up with a few keyword optimised links also? If so, what sort of ratio would you suggest?</p> <p>Many thanks</p></noscript>

[paints-n-design]

SamuelScott is 100% right, I only wanted to add, that we should stop thinking about the anchor. It is allways manipulation in the room, when we think about anchor. Thats my opinion.

[SamuelScott]

Seeing as this replaces a traditional link, which I'd very much doubt would carry a nofollow (these event organisers would not be aware of it) then would you agree that a 'powered by' link under the box would be ok without a nofollow, as long as we just use our brand as the anchor text?

How about a brandname + keyword anchor text? Such as "ticket sales powered by xyx"

I hate to sound negative, but this part of your response still seems like you are trying to use the widget to build links that will pass "PageRank" and increase your rankings. My recommendation is still: Do not do this at all! Such links are completely artificial and are one of the old tricks that Google definitely looks for today. Just because other sites do it right now does not mean that Google won't hit them at some point.

I stand by my recommendation: Use a no-follow attribute and make the name of your brand the anchor text. At the very most, putting a desired phrase such as "ticket sales" close to the link -- but not included in the actual link -- may help you out of the idea of co-occurance (sometimes called cocitation).

If you want to get more links, I suggest going through Moz's category archive for that phrase to see how to get links that are 99% natural and earned (rather than artificial and built).

[benseb]

Great, thanks for the info.

I'm pretty sure this wouldn't be seen badly by Google as it provided a valuable tool for the website - selling tickets. The 'old way' of doing this would be for the event owner to link directly through to our website ('buy tickets here...'), but using the widget we can improve conversions - keeping to Google's rules of designing for the customer, not SEO, I think this fits the bill. Adding a 'powered by' link also enhances customer trust?

An example of another company doing something similar, is

Eventbrite: http://www.outlookfestival.com/tickets/   (they include no on page link, just an iframe but that includes a link)

Ticketscript: http://deershedfestival.com/tickets/ (an optimised keyword, and it's almost hidden (tooltip) which I'd prefer to keep away from.)

Seeing as this replaces a traditional link, which I'd very much doubt would carry a nofollow (these event organisers would not be aware of it) then would you agree that a 'powered by' link under the box would be ok without a nofollow, as long as we just use our brand as the anchor text?

How about a brandname + keyword anchor text? Such as "ticket sales powered by xyx"

[SamuelScott]

First, I highly recommend that you do not use widgets on external websites as part of any "linkbuilding strategy." (I'm not saying that you are using the widgets as a cheap way to build links -- they can have a lot of valid uses, so I just hope that you are using them in the correct way.)

Matt Cutts, the head of Google's webspam team, said in 2013 that any links in widgets on third-party websites should have the no-follow attribute added to them. In Google's eyes, here's the simple reason why: Why should the search engine give you "credit" for a link that you have given yourself? The only links that Google wants to count are those that are 100% natural and "earned." The Penguin updates -- among other actions -- are all aimed at moving the search engine in that direction. (Here's Google's guide to no-follow.)

Secondly, don't even think about keyword-based anchor text. (No-follow or not, you just don't want to risk incurring the wrath of the Penguin.) If you need a link back in the widget, just make the brand name of the website / company into the link.

In summary:

1. Add no-follow to all widget links

2. Make the brand name the anchor text