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On-page Aspects of Optimization: Internal Link Structure
Author: Michael Black, President
Making some small changes within
your site’s link structure can have a big impact on how your site is
ranked. Optimizing your navigation can be simple as long as you keep a
few things in mind. In this article we’ll examine a few of these;
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Usability: The first and most important point is to create navigation
structure that is both intuitive and user friendly. If you are designing
your site, place links throughout your site where you think that users
will look for them and make them eye catching to be sure that your
visitors will follow the links deeper into your site.
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Text Links: For Search Engine Optimization purposes, try to avoid using
image links wherever possible. Remember, a picture is worth 1000 words
to a user, but worth nothing to a Search Engine. Deploying text links
on your site will help the user and the Search Engine determine where
they are going.
- Link text:
Make sure that your links are titled correctly. You want links to
pages to reflect their most important content. IF a page is
selling blue widgets, you want the links to that page to say: Blue
Widgets.
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Linking from inside text: Try to link to other relevant pages from
within the text on your site. This will help guide the user and the
Search Engine to more information about the topic and raise the site’s
value in the Search Engine’s eyes.
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Sitemap: Be sure to make a good sitemap. When making a sitemap, it’s
important to use descriptive text links. Try to keep the total number
of links on your sitemap under 100 links. Search Engines don’t reliably
or completely spider sitemaps larger than 100 links.
- Style:
Finally, don't think that because you are using text links on your site
that you only have one option for the link; undecorated text. You
can use Cascading Style Sheets to add some color and rollover behavior
to your links.
An intuitive
internal link structure will help guide your site’s users to the
information the want, and will help raise your site’s positioning in the
Search Engines.
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