How Much Anchor Text Is Enough?
A reader asks Kalena Jordan this question:
Quick question for ya if you got a minute. If I’m targeting a keyword or phrase, lets say dogs. I write a 500 word article about dogs. I post it on my site. I want to target my main url i.e. www.dogs.com. How many times can I create anchor text in that one article that links to the main page?
Her answer was good, but it was incomplete. In terms of anchor text, one instance of it on one page is enough – at least as it relates to pointing toward another page. Let me explain.
Search engines look at anchor text, but they don’t want you spamming them. If you have a page that uses the same anchor text over and over again and each time you link to the same page then it will look like spam. That’s why I say alter the anchor text and point it to a different page. Here’s an example:
You have a website about the ways you can use bread dough in recipes. On that web site is a page about doughnuts and another page about chicken and dumplings (hungry yet?). On the doughnuts page you mention that you can roll your bread dough just like you did in the recipe for chicken and dumplings and you hyperlink chicken and dumplings to the appropriate page on your website. That’s good. Further down on the page you decide to make another reference to chicken and dumplings and link it to the same page again. It’s not really necessary for a couple of reasons.
No. 1, doughnuts and chicken and dumplings really don’t relate to each other too well. Yes, you can make both with bread dough. I got that. So does Google. Make your point then go on.
No. 2, Google will give you credit for the first anchor text but likely not the second. That is, you aren’t going to get two credits for two instances of anchor text from the one page to another twice. You’re wasting your links by doing that. Just use one instance of anchor text.
An alternative way to use anchor text is to pick two or three keywords per page as part the Search Engine Optimization. One time on your page, link each of those keywords to a different page on your website and (Kalena’s right) make sure that the page you are linking to is actually about what your anchor text link says it’s about.
7 Responses to “How Much Anchor Text Is Enough?”
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Hi Nick
Thanks for the link love! When I said 2 or 3 instances, I was referring to keywords, not anchor text links. You’re right, too many links to a page using the same anchor text is dodgy and unnecessary. I will alter my post slightly to clarify this in case the question submitter also misunderstood my meaning. Cheers!
[...] Nick from Search Engine Optimization Journal has blogged about this post. He took from my comments above that when I said 2 or 3 instances per page, I was referring to [...]
[...] Nothing strange there, we all try things out and report on the results. Checking back through some of our older posts I came across three different posts where I mentioned this outcome. Search engine optimization tells us that internal linking is important, particularly if it is relevant. If your interested I suggest you look at the post on how much anchor text is enough? [...]
The only real reason to do it more than once is for the user. In other words, having a link in your top or side navigation to another page in your website, then also linking that page again within the body of the text in the webpage, even using the same anchor text.
It won’t improve the seo having that second link but it may improve the number of clicks you get to the page you are linking to.
Working up a website. This helped me out a lot. Figured I would show some love for it, get you some fresh content. Thanks!
This article is very helpful. I am just now going through all of my blog posts for our Cosmetic Dentistry blog and adding anchor text links. I think I may have done the doubleup in a couple of instances, but I won’t in the future. After reading your article, it really makes a lot of sense to just have one anchor text link per page that you want to link back to and then to have other different ones that link back to your page. Many thanks for the information.
Thanks for reading and best of luck Gil!