by Rick Hendershot, Linknet Publishing Network
Linking continues to be an important factor in the success of every online entrepreneur. But many people who are new to the online world do not understand some of the most basic things the search engines are looking for in links.
Definitions: Link Text and Anchor Text
Not everybody uses the same terminology, so here is mine:
Anchor text is the word or phrase which is hyperlinked. For instance in this paragraph, this is the anchor text because it is the hyperlinked phrase.
Link text refers to the one or two sentences that accompany the anchor text. Since links are often planted like ads, we have the opportunity to create a little context surrounding our anchor text. This helps to establish the subject matter of our link, and therefore helps us make the link "relevant" to a specific area of interest.
Link target is the web page pointed to by the link.
Creating "natural" links
The linking model for Google is the "natural" link. A natural link grows directly out of the context of a published piece. For instance, in certain articles and my free email course I discuss how to get links. The link in the preceding sentence arises naturally within the context of my article, and since this is the kind of link Google values so highly and expects us to emulate, there are a couple of things worth noting about it.
First, a "natural" link arises within a specific context. In this case, the context is an article about linking. If the link I have created points to another article about linking, then clearly these articles are relevant to each other, and the link is a "relevant" link. One article about linking points to another article about linking. This is the kind of "relevance" Google assumes a "natural" link will have.
Conclusion - Create a context that establishes the area of relevance of your link. This is what you use the one or two sentence link text for.
Second, think of the anchor text of a "natural" link as a keyword or search term. The assumption Google makes is that the article referenced by the link (the link target) is about the subject defined in the anchor text. In the example above the keyword in the anchor text is "how to get links." Google makes the perfectly reasonable assumption that the target article is about "how to get links."
Now think about this from the searcher's point of view. If you are looking for advice on getting links, a search term you might plug into Google (or some other search engine) is "how to get links". Is Google likely to include the target page reference above in its search results?
Yes.
Why? Because Google now has two reasons to think that article is about "how to get links". First, the article itself contains lots of references to "how to get links". Second, the inbound link above reinforces the conclusion that the target article is about "how to get links". Two sources have agreed that the target page contains valuable information about "how to get links".
Conclusion - Embed a keyword within your anchor text that reflects the search term that searchers are likely to use when looking for your service.
When creating links pointing to your site, ask yourself "What search term or keyword are people likely to use when searching for my kind of service?" If your site is about "gourmet tea baskets", then use that in your anchor text. If it is about "free web tools", then use that. If it is about a "special business opportunity", then use that term in your anchor text.
To have your relevant links embedded within original articles, and posted around the web, see our new program called the Linknet Promote with Articles Program.