April 30th, 2010 by Nick

Any good SEO company will tell you that one of the most important things is the usability of your website. The way in which your website is structured and how it works within itself is very important, as it forms the base of how your website flows and how easy it is for the consumer to use. Internal linking refers to the way in which the links to various pages within your website relate to each other, and how simple and straightforward the navigation is.

Internal links are relevant in two ways. Firstly, they are relevant from a search engine point of view. For a higher search ranking with SERPs and an increased clickthrough rate you should ensure that it is not just your homepage that a search engine will lead to. This is ideal for common pages which are viewed or information which is most sought after. You may not choose to make every page recognisable by a search engine at the risk of increasing your bounce rate, however having several pages linked via a search engine will help drive traffic to your site.

Clear navigation is the most important aspect when it comes to internal SEO linking. Most home pages have a clear navigation bar, either along the top or down the left hand side. Any internal links to other pages within your site should be easy to identify and it is a good idea to include a few of your most relevant keywords within a handful of these links. This will ensure that search engines pick them up from your hosting page and users find what they are looking for. Any page which is reachable within a couple of clicks from your homepage will rank better than a page which takes ten clicks to get there.

Within your website, it should be easy for users to navigate themselves back to the homepage. We have all been in the situation where we have been browsing through various web pages and suddenly we cannot find our way back to where we started. A person using your site may be looking for four or five pieces of information, so they need to be able to switch back and forth between pages easily. A good way to do this is ensure that any phrases which are your key ones link to the relevant page. For example, if you are writing a blog and mention social media marketing, then make sure that the phrase links to the page of your site where you talk about social media marketing. This is particularly effective when your company name is mentioned, use your name as a link back to the main hosting page.

That being said, you also need to ensure your content is not jam packed with links. If you mention your company name three times within a blog, you only need one of these to be a link back to your home page. Overcrowding of links can be off putting for consumers, so you need to get a good balance.

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One Response to “Gain A Higher Search Engine Ranking Via Internal Linking”

1. Eon Softtech says:

   May 1, 2010 at 5:55 am

   I notice that you practice what you preach. Most of your blog posts are interlinked via keywords.

   Cheers!