The importance of internal links in SEO

 

The power of internal links 

 There are two types of links that are important in digital marketing: backlinks (or "backlinks") and internal links (or "deep links"). Blogs specializing in SEO tend to be more interested in backlinks in their articles because they affect the authority level of your domain and therefore your SEO. In addition, for newcomers to the world of digital marketing, obtaining back links is often akin to the Stations of the Cross and all advice in this area is therefore welcome. The rankingCoach blog is no exception to the rule: we have already devoted many articles to backlinks. This is why today we have decided to take an interest in another type of link: deep links.  redditbooks

 What are internal links? 

 We started this article by discussing backlinks. If you want to know more about it, I invite you to discover this article from our blog .  

If you click on the hyperlink above, you will be automatically redirected to another article on the rankingCoach blog, so this link is a perfect example of an internal link. It is very easy to create this kind of link in a Word or Google Docs document: 

 Select the text box where you want to add a link; 

• Right click; 
• Click on the "link" icon in the form of a chain; 
• Copy the URL of the page to which you want to redirect your visitors; 
• Click on "Apply".

 If you analyze the source code of the page you are reading, you will find the following line of code at the hyperlink location:  superhealthiness 

 Avoid dead links  

 Whether you are using Word, Google Docs, or HTML code to insert your internal links, make sure you don't embed any dead links. Also, be twice as careful when integrating them manually because you are more likely to make a small code mistake that could have big consequences. 

 If you enter the wrong line of code or the wrong URL, people who click on your link will be redirected to a page with the 404 error code. From a the user experience point of view, this is of course. to avoid. Besides, it can also hurt your SEO as dead links are considered a negative ranking factor. But how do you know if a link needs to be replaced? Nothing could be simpler: just click on it and make sure you are redirected to the right page.

 Use a simple code 

 In a video dedicated to links and Javascript and published last month on the Youtube Google Webmaster account , Martin Spitt advises to use the simplest possible code when inserting links. He explains that it is better to use the standard href code (as in the example above) and only use Java sparingly. For my part, I would go even further and say: unless you know exactly what you are doing, avoid Java altogether and stick to basic HTML code for your links.   tophealthfitnesstips 

 Think about your visitors 

 Deep linking improves the user experience and increases the time visitors spend on a site, which is very good for conversion and bounce rates. You can use internal links to guide people to other interesting content related to the content they are reading. Internal links are also used to make your site easier to navigate by drawing visitors' attention to content they might not otherwise have found.  

 Categorize your content 

Internal links also allow you to categorize and present your content in a way that matches readers' preferences and the page they are visiting. For example, this is what the links at the end of this article are for. They refer to other content from our blog on SEO and digital marketing related to the topic of this article. You can also create links to product pages. Building interesting and relevant links also increases the chances that people will visit more pages and stay on your site, which in the long run will have a positive impact on your users' experience and conversions.   fashionglee 

 Guide the Googlebots

 Also, these links aren't just for human visitors, they're also useful for search engine crawlers, especially if you haven't sent a sitemap to Google. Internal links, whether in your page's menu or in its content, help Googlebots crawl your site and find new pages. It is therefore important to build your links logically. We often hear that visitors should have access to any page on your site with just three clicks from the home page, the rule is the same for Googlebots. Take the time to look at the structure of your site and, if you find pages isolated from the rest of your site, 

 4 things to never do 

 Avoid linking all of your pages to each other: deep links should be used to create a logical structure and link pages that have a thematic link.

1. Don't just link to a subpage, find a way to link that subpage to the rest of your site.
2. Do not use a "nofollow" link to build internal links because the "nofollow" tells Googlebots not to crawl the page at the end of the link, so they may never find it.
3. Do not create links blocked by your robots.txt (for the same reason that you should not use the nofollow link).

 5 things to do absolutely  

 Only direct your visitors to pages that are of interest to them:

 Make your links visually stand out from the rest of the text (Sometimes it is possible to change their appearance, but they are usually displayed in blue and underlined).

1. Add links in the content of your subpages and not just in your navigation menu, header or footer.
2. Remove the links that lead to pages that no longer exist (dead links).
3. Avoid always using the same links on a subpage.
4. Anchor your links to sentences or phrases formulated in a correct and understandable way which have a thematic link with the page to which you are redirecting your Internet users.