search-engine-optimization-anchor-text

So what is Anchor Text?

In a nutshell Anchor Text, for search engine optimization and conversion, is the clickable text (link) that shows in the content of a page and is clicked to direct someone to another page or content.

Why is Anchor Text so important?

Search Engines use anchor text to help rank the linked pages because the anchor text is usually relevant to the landing page. Remember, the goal of all search engines is to list the best and most relevant content or pages highest in their results.

Years ago, webmasters would use anchor text to help get high rankings with the use of “Google Bombing”. However Google changed their algorithm to detect this black hat practice. Google watches for the over-use of exact phrase anchor text on inbound and internal links. Too many identical anchor text links and say goodbye. SEO Guru’s call this getting “sandboxed”.

A good linking strategy includes a variety of techniques. We will cover these later. However, a good rule of thumb is to marry the relevance of the anchor text to the content of the outbound page. Do not use “click here’ or “more info” as they do nothing for you linking relevance. Be careful not to use long anchor text phrases. We normally do not exceed 3 words in any anchor text.

There are good free tools available on the internet to report your outbound and inbound link structure. We will provide a recommended tools list in later tips.

Here is some recommendations for Google.