Key words in text links
Friday, January 23rd, 2004Here is my second ever post on this blog according to archive.org.
I recently realized something I’ve been doing wrong since I started ESL go.com – English as a second language learning and teaching and that is the text of the hyperlinks. For example a link like ESLgo doesn’t help for the keyword ESL. That’s why a domain name like esl-go might have been better. Now I realize the problem and ask people to put ESL go in the text link. Of course other ESL sites don’t want me to do better in the search engines so I get annoyed dealing with webmasters who insist on eslgo for my site’s link text.
Another thing I realized is that graphic links don’t contain any keywords. Master of the obvious eh? On my site, I have a graphic header and drop down menus for a footer, and in the end my 250 pages of internal links don’t help me out with key words at all. The header has to stay, but my footer will be redesigned to consist of keyword rich text links.
What we need to add to the January 23, 2004 discussion is that graphic links have alt text and some people theorize that alt text counts as anchor text.
Also, variety shows search engines your links are natural. So if every link says “sports betting online” search engines know something weird is going on. But if some say “sports betting” others say “sports betting online” others say “sports betting tips” some say “click here” some say “this site” some are image links, etc. then search engine bots should see a site that is naturally integrated into the fabric of the web.
At least I’ve learned something in the past 4.5 years…