What Are Internal Links in SEO?

When you’re building a website, you’ll want to do everything you can to increase your search engine optimization (SEO). There are many ways to optimize your website, with keywords being the most common but not the most efficient.

What are internal links in SEO? An internal link means you’re sending visitors from one page of your website to another. You’re giving them access to more information while keeping them on your domain.

Internal links are essential for search engines. Think about it: if there’s no link to your site, no one can find it. Links on your site map and menu are suitable for navigation, but contextual links are the best way to engage visitors and help them find the information they need.

What is an Internal Link?

An internal link is a hyperlink on a website that links to another page on the same website.

If you’re reading a blog post, a landing page, or any other webpage, you’ll probably see various links – they are generally a different color text, or they are underlined or bolded. All links are either internal or external. An external link sends anyone who clicks it to another website with a different domain.

How to Use Internal Links for SEO 

Search engines prefer results from sites with many other places linking to them because this makes a page seem more credible. If other webpages point to your website page as a resource, then that page must provide useful information on the topic covered.

External sites linking to your page are ideal for establishing credibility, too, but internal links can help, and they are something you can easily implement on your own. While it can be difficult to build external backlinks to your website, it’s easy to link from one of your own web pages to another.

Don’t get confused: using internal links on your site does not increase your Domain Authority score, but they’re worth using because you’ll rank higher in search results. They also create context for both readers and search engines like Google to better understand what information is on a given page. 

However, you can benefit by linking to less-trafficked pages on your site with more authority, such as a home page. You can use Google’s Search Console to find out how your pages rank, and then add internal links accordingly.

Just as linking content on a menu or sitemap won’t increase your SEO, neither will creating internal links with text that says “click here” or “read more.” The most effective internal links tell the reader what they’ll find on the linked page. The words that you place a link on are called “anchor text” and they can help set the context for what you’ll find on that page. 

If you’re reviewing different blenders, link to a specific review by linking text like “the most portable blender” instead of writing “the best blender is this one,” with “this one” being the linked text. Believe it or not, using quality text for your links does make a difference in search results.

With that in mind, use your text anchors and links naturally. Don’t force a link that won’t work in your content and link a phrase to a random page. Users click on text expected to find further information on that subject, and if they don’t, they’ll feel misled and possibly close out of your site altogether.

Why Use Internal Links?

Using internal linking for SEO means you’ll increase your site’s ranking power while ensuring your audience sticks around for a longer time. Longer visit duration will also benefit your SEO. If a user comes to your page and spends a few minutes on one page before leaving, it may suggest to search engine algorithms that that page was not helpful. 

Adding internal links into your website content will keep a user clicking around, visiting various pages on your site, which increases traffic. They will be able to access more information on your page, so they’ll stay for a longer time while still getting the information they need.

Final Thoughts

Internal linking is an important part of any good website and SEO strategy. SEO aside, linking between website pages is helpful for your visitors, improving their user experience on your site. With the added benefit of improving your site’s search engine optimization, you should absolutely consider adding internal links on your website’s posts and pages.