Is this still considered true about INTERNAL anchor text? "Penguin seems to be targeting overly aggressive anchor text (both internally and externally), especially from low-quality sources."
-
Recently I've heard a few people say now it's okay to be aggressive with internal linking. So a link from mydomain.com/news to mydomain/widgets can use spammy anchor text like "best green widgets in California" that are an obvious problem for links coming in from external site.
Which is accurate?
-
Here's Matt Cutts on the subject:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ybpXU0ckKQ
Basically he's saying that you are perfectly ok to have exact match anchored internal links. But, if it becomes really obvious that you're overdoing it to try to manipulate Google then you're at risk for a manual penalty.
Look at wikipedia. They are the perfect example of a site that has a LOT of exact match anchors. And they do pretty well.
-
Me either. Previously you asked, "Is there any difference in Google's treatment of aggressive anchor text between internal and external?" Externally, if every link pointing to your 'green widget' page or home page said, 'green widget' you'd likely get penalized by Google. Internally, linking to your page as such navigationally and in context like EGOL mentioned is fine. So there's a major difference right there. I don't think it's a question of 'being aggresive with it' just that you can refer to your own pages more precisely within the context of your own site.
-
Im not sure we're communicating. I am well aware of how aggressive anchor text from external links causes problems with Google.
I need to get an idea of how approximately how much leeway there is for internal anchor text. I was told by two people I respect that internal anchor text can be much more aggressive.
-
Read: http://moz.com/blog/most-important-link-penalty-removal-tool-your-mindset. Very much so. Google knows what a natural link profile looks like so well that you're best bet is gaining external links as naturally as possible. Sites with super high percentages of anchor text links, followed links, and conversion page specific links are running red flags in front of Google's eyes. Take Eric's advice from above. Cheers!
-
Thanks for reply. Is there any difference in Google's treatment of aggressive anchor text between internal and external?
-
Like EGOL mentions, going after unnaturally long links--and the type of copy that falls afield of some of the Adwords policy--is likely to cause issues in your work to aggressively link internally. What is fine is remaining factual and linking to your 'green widgets' page with the link, 'green widgets'. Just look at Wikipedia's level of internal linking...
Leave the best of stuff to review sites or pages.
-
I use anchor text like "green widgets" in persistent navigation and in paragraph text on all of my sites and have no problems.
Now, if you are using chest-thumping anchor text like... "best green widgets in California"... then you might be asking for it.
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
-
Duplicate Content in Footers (Not as routine as it seems)
Hello there, I know that content in the footer of sites are safe from duplication penalisation; however, what if the footers where replicated across different subdomains? For instance, the footer was duplicated across: www.example.com blog.example.com blog2.example.com I don't see it as a big issue personally; however, outsourced "specialists" seem to think that this is causing duplication problems and therefore negatively affecting the ranking power of "lesser" subdomains i.e. not the www version, which is by far the strongest subdomain. Would be good to get some insight if anybody has any. Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | SEONOW1230 -
Web Design - Text links better than drop down menus?
Hello So with reading a blog post by Bruce Clay - http://www.bruceclay.com/blog/seo-friendly-web-design/ It reads that it Is best for seo to use text links instead of drop down menus. So I just wanted to ask you opinion.
On-Page Optimization | | Berner0 -
Text Placement?
We have an eCommerce site. We have noticed several of our competitors are moving their text to the top of the page. How much of a difference to you think it makes in googles eyes to have the text at the top above the products vs bellow them? Here is an example of how one of them moved the text to the top http://www.motorcycle-superstore.com/119/MNGR/Motorcycle-Jackets.aspx
On-Page Optimization | | DoRM0 -
Internal Linking
Hi Everyone, Should i be careful of how many internal links I have on one page? For example if i have a page that contains 700 words, can i have 5, 10, 15 internal links linking to other pages on my website? Is there a ratio for best practice. I know that internal linking is important for spiders to crawl your website but at the same time dont make it look spammy. I hope this makes sense. Thanks for any help.
On-Page Optimization | | Paul780 -
Internal Followed Links:
Ran Open site explorer on my site: www.psbsperakers.com It is saying that I only have "1" Internal followed link could somebody tell me what that means... and maybe take a look at my site and see it this is a quick fix?
On-Page Optimization | | kevin48030 -
How impactful will text at the bottom of the page be?
If the most important content for humans on my page is images (e.g., a picture gallery), but there is very little text high up on the page, how impactful will a text description at the bottom of the page be? I've seen a few other sites put content paragraphs at the bottom of their pages. LIke so: http://www.purpletrail.com/invitations-online http://www.tinyprints.com/ Is this something I would do well to emulate?
On-Page Optimization | | Ehren0 -
Canonical URL's - Fixed but still negatively impacted
I recently noticed that our canonical url's were not set up correctly. The incorrect setup predates me but it could have been in place for close to a year, maybe a bit more. Each of the url's had a "sortby" parameter on all of them. I had our platform provider make the fix and now everything is as it should be. I do see issues caused by this in Google Webmaster, for instance in the HTML suggestions it's telling me that pages have duplicate title tags when in fact this is the same page but with a variety of url parameters at the end of the url. To me this just highlights that there is a problem and we are being negatively impacted by the previous implementation. My question is has anyone been in this situation? Is there any way to flush this out or push Google to relook at this? Or is this a sit and be patient situation. I'm also slightly curious if Google will at some point look and see that the canonical urls were changed and then throw up a red flag even though they are finally the way they should be. Any feedback is appreciated. Thanks,
On-Page Optimization | | dgmiles
Dave0 -
SEO value of "in the news" links on home page?
Notice more sites have an "in the News" section on the home page, or something similar like press releases... Apart from providing users fresh content, is there an SEO value to this? What is the explanation for this? Have a feeling the answer is obvious but just not too sure Thanks a lot.
On-Page Optimization | | inhouseninja0