Any opinions about the common anchor text?
-
Hey guys so I was reviewing my website to make sure there are no exact anchor texts repeated throughout the site.
But I was wondering what are your thoughts about the common (and useless) anchor text like "read more", "learn more", "see more information", "contact us", and things of that nature. These are usually repeated across the majority of sites out there, how does Google differentiate between over optimized anchor text and these common anchor texts?
-
I wouldn't worry too much about those. Just focus on keeping your site natural.
-
You are going to see very little benefit from optimized anchor text on internal links. Use the anchor text that will most encourage your users to keep clicking through. This doesn't mean necessarily "read more", though. Think about calls to action in anchor text that are more compelling.
-
These common or 'useless' anchor texts are what search engines grew up with. Before marketers started using anchor text to manipulate search engines, "read more," "learn more" etc was fairly common. Try focusing less on anchor text and more on the proximity of words around anchor text instead.
I'm not sure how Google differentiates between the two, but then again I don't really care because I don't use anchor text to improve rankings. I let my quality content do that.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How can I maximize my On Page for these two common usages
I have a page that is tuned for this query: 1886 ten dollar bill and I am happy with my placement. The same page performs poorly if someone types: 1886 $10 dollar bill Is there anything I can do short of having another page tuned for the $ rather than 10?
On-Page Optimization | | Banknotes0 -
Use of trademarks in tags and text
Does Google spider read registered trademarks (the 'R' or 'TM') or do these marks impede anything if they are featured in meta tags or text?
On-Page Optimization | | KnutDSvendsen0 -
Scrolling Javascript News Ticker messing up Anchor Text.
I have a javascript scrolling news ticker on my site but it seems to play havoc with my anchor text. I like it because it scrolls through showing a new set of pages. I set it to the ones I've just uploaded and it seems to help them get followed and indexed. However when I use site explorer I can see the recorded anchor text for a link to a page is incorrect and it's taking the text from the news ticker. Even when a link has come from the news ticker url it seems to take anchor text from the ticker order list before or after. It's as if it records the anchor text and then when it follows the link to the page the ticker has changed to a new link Is this ticker bad for seo? it certainly jumbles up my anchor text, could that be a good thing? Is there an SEO friendly news ticker for newly added products?
On-Page Optimization | | Peter24680 -
Internal Link Title and Anchor Text Question
So, I am kind of a newbie with all of this stuff, so please bear with me! If you have a chance to look into the domain it's www.noip.com I have checked the internal followed and 301 links. It seems like it is pulling in all of our navigation a funky way. all of those link have no data for the title and the anchor text is Home, Contact Us, Forgot Password?, ETC. Is this correct? I have tried to look into the way other websites are doing it and it seems wrong. I tried to talk to my developer, but he is not so sure. Do we simply need to make more copy on our site that has internal links within the copy with anchor text that is for keywords that I would like to be ranking for? Like Managed DNS? and then that page goes to the managed DNS page? Or what? Sorry if i am not being totally clear. Any help and advice is 110% welcomed!!! Natalie
On-Page Optimization | | vwnatalie0 -
On page/site - Images & bold text
As I understand it on a page where you are going for the keywords 'Metal gates', you have an image titled 'Metal gates' (Lets say MG for Metal gates to save on my typing!) with the alt tag being 'MG' Now as I also understand it, if an image is also used as a link the Alt tag is also the anchor text? So, I have a page on Metal gates using the above methods, from this page I have image links to a metal driveway gates page (as well as text links), would I be best using an image titled 'Metal driveway gates' with the alt text as ' Metal driveway gates' to link to my metal driveway gates page (if you follow me)? Also on the image question, what if you have say six images (that are all links) on the metal gates page, how would you title the images and alt tags? Variations on Metal gates? Or using the keyword on the page that the link points to? (I'm not looking to keyword stuff but want to get it right! ) Also is it important to have your on page keywords in bold still? i ask because I've bolded text on my pages but not the main keywords - I've bolded text that I want people to see, but do not want to take away any power from my keywords if you follow me?
On-Page Optimization | | Jon-C0 -
Is Googlebot seeing text in my 'Read More' bar and could they even be penalising me for it?
Hi guys. Our web developers have put a read more bar that contains the on page SEO text for our webpage. By default, the read more bar is not expanded and you cannot see the text within. If you click 'Read More', the box expands and the text is shown on the page. I was wondering if googlebot is seeing this text at all - it's really important that it does because it contains all the on-page SEO text. I also wondered if this type of approach is still considered 'white hat'? If it's not, could google be penalising us for it? Thanks,
On-Page Optimization | | CarlDarby0 -
Anchor text on outbound links on a blog, relevancy detrimental or positive?
We have a blog related to computer support, and we have been using guest posts and promotion of those posts to boost freshness and rankings of the blog. We have been restricting outbound links to prevent words such as 'computer repair, 'computer support' etc, because we were under the impression that if we want to rank for those words, we should only allow INCOMING links with that anchor text, and that outbound links from the page, would rob the other parts of the site of the link juice this page provides. My question is, is this wrong? Should I freely allow outbound links on my blog page that contain anchor text that I my self am trying to rank for? Or was I correct initially? Current the anchor text is in 'related' industries, such as mobile apps, technology news, etc...things that google might think are 'related', but not exactly what the site is about.
On-Page Optimization | | ilyaelbert0 -
On site optimization - anchor text in body text
Hi I am learning SEO from scratch and am only a couple of weeks in. My wife has just started a website selling children clothes. In the left bar there are links to the different producers. Clicking it takes you to the products from that producer. In the body text om the main page ( epleskrinet.no) the same producers are mentioned. By time i need to opitmize for all of these. Is there any point in making them anchor text - taking them to the same URL as is given in the side bar ? Or will it get discounted ? Dan Laerum
On-Page Optimization | | danlae0