What is internal linking?
Internal linking is the action of creating a network of internal links within your own website.
Finally, you already know about internal networking:
- sometimes, you read an article, and we suggest you read another on the same site via a link
- or more simply, on a home page, you’ll find links that take you to other pages on the site
Internal linking is not the same as netlinking or backlinking, which concern the management of external links.
First of all, internal linking is used to optimize and streamline site navigation. We check that all URLs point to at least 1 other internal link.
What the Google algorithm requires, it will receive..
(for good reason, though).
Let’s assume that Google’s algorithm will always protect its visitors.
This means offering informative, useful and coherent content to its users:
- coherent in terms of the consistency of the research carried out in relation to its results
- and useful for rich page content.
Reasons why you should do internal linking
Reason #1
If there aren’t enough links in your pages → not enough “link juice” (=sharing energy),
→ Your pages won’t have enough weight to get a PageRank (=ranking the quality and quantity of a page’s links),
→ Which means they won’t be recognized/indexed by Google (SEO)
Reason #2
If the depth of your pages is too great, and access to them too long,
→ Then Google will take time to crawl your site,
→ This will lead to difficult indexing, and therefore poor positioning.
FYI: this happens very often for e-commerce sites, or large sites such as Blogs.
Reason #3
If one of your pages doesn’t have an inbound link via another of your pages,
→ Then it’s considered useless by Google, which goes against the premise said earlier,
→ The consequence is that your page will not be indexed by Google.
FYI: we call them orphan pages.
Reason #4
Google also appreciates it when internal linking is consistent and stays on the same theme.
An example to avoid: pointing to one of your articles on household products when the subject is office chairs. Okay, that was obvious. BUT you had to give an example 💁♀️
Tip!
Google’s algorithm likes (A LOT) link anchors. In other words, the text visible in the link that you put “behind”. After all, it’s an opportunity to add keywords synonymous with your target query (=main topic).
This enriches your page with keywords and increases your ranking on Google.
But beware of keywords stuffing…! Every year, Google’s algorithm gets better at spotting sites that want to cheat. In particular, it detects pages full of links and keywords that have no links at all.
Reasons why you should do internal linking
In addition to helping with indexing and positioning on Google, internal linking has other advantages such as :
- keep visitors longer
- have them converted
In fact, thanks to these link silos, you can keep your users browsing your site for longer than expected. However, this depends on the relevance of your links.
Thanks to this meshing, you can engage your prospects more effectively and provide them with truly informative and comprehensive content.
Where to start? How do you get started? We give you our tips
If your site doesn’t contain any internal links, you’ve got a few steps ahead of you.
Nothing insurmountable, I promise!
You're just starting out
If you’re just starting out with your site (best-case scenario), you can adapt your tree structure from the outset to accommodate internal linking.
Tips
- integrate the breadcrumb trail into each of your pages,
- create article categories on your blog (particularly important for B2B),
- perform user tests on people who know nothing about your business,
- imagine a silo of links like a course with the main page and your chapters with the “daughter” pages,
- check that all your pages are linked and not orphaned.
You already have a site
If you already have a site, the best thing to do is to have it assessed either by an agency, or by online tools (sometimes for a fee). These are known as site “audits”.
→ From there, you’ll know where your weak points are, particularly in your overall tree structure. Once the latter has been adjusted, you look at how many of your pages need to disappear or merge together. Then define the number of orphan pages you need to mesh together.
Once you’ve done that, all you have to do is imagine yourself (or better still, call in a tester) in your target’s shoes, navigating your site. You look at where the sticking points are, analyze them and see how you can address them.
For example: add 2 to 4 links to related articles on the subject covered by one of your pages. This will clearly add weight to your page, bring coherence (so appreciated by Google) and create a silo without realizing it. Because you’ll already have meshed links to these articles too.
