Anchor text is the term used to describe the “clickable” text in a hyperlink. Clicking this text enables the user to move quickly to the linked location or document. Anchor text is clearly differentiated from the surrounding text, often by underlining or different colored text. 

Anchor text is an important part of SEO and digital marketing. It is used to “anchor” links that organize your site and direct traffic to it. Used properly, anchor text can make a big impact on your company’s success. This article provides a brief definition of SEO and continues with an in-depth discussion of the use of anchor text, with an emphasis on creating backlinks. 

SEO – A Brief Definition

SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is an important component of digital marketing that focuses on bringing organic traffic to your site. SEO best practices are used to create content that can bring this critical traffic.

The primary objective of SEO is to convince search engines like Google to recommend your content as the best solution to their problem or the best answer to their question.

Google reigns over search: 88% of all searches on desktops and 96% of all searches on mobile are Google searches. When a user asks a question, Google attempts to offer the answer. When a user needs to solve a problem, Google attempts to offer the solution.

SERPs are the Search Engine Results Pages that Google provides in its attempt to help the user find a solution. Your content’s position in these results pages is its ranking. SEO is the key to a high ranking and finding your content early in the SERPs – without paying for advertisements. 

What is Anchor Text?

When a user types this query: “What is anchor text?” the SERPs that Google returns are influenced by the use of the words “anchor text” in the links on the sites displayed. Anchor text meaning encompasses much more than the “clickable” words used as text to link to another document or location. 

What is anchor text in digital marketing?

As previously noted, SEO is a critical component of digital marketing. A good answer to “What is anchor text in digital marketing?” is that anchor text is a commonly neglected but powerful SEO tool that can help your site achieve higher rankings in SERPs.

Google sees links as important sources of information. Internal and external links are part of the criteria that search engines use to determine whether your company can provide a solution to a user’s problem, or answer a user’s question. The anchor text used for your links is an important part of Google’s ranking criteria.

Internal vs. External Links: External links point from one domain to an entirely separate domain. Internal links only point within your own specific website or domain.

How to Create Anchor Text for Internal Links

Internal links are links to another page of one domain. Google uses internal links to find and organize the information on your company’s site. Index your site by linking to pages on your site from your homepage and your sitemap. This helps both Google and users easily find information on your site. These internal links also give your homepage authority to the linked pages on your site, helping with your rankings. 

Both Google and users will be confused if you use the same keyword to link to different pages. A website in which every anchor text has the keyword “chocolate” will be impossible to navigate. In this case, chocolate would be easier for everyone to find if the keyword “chocolate” was taken out of the anchor text.

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A note: if you link to the same page twice from your homepage, Google only uses the anchor text in the first link as ranking criteria. 

If you sell men’s, women’s, and children’s clothing, your anchor text might look like this:

• Link from your site’s homepage and sitemap to pages with clothing for men, women, and children. 
• Link from each of these pages and the sitemap to the pages with various types of clothing, such as tops, bottoms and footwear. 

While highly oversimplified, this example demonstrates the use of descriptions as anchor text when constructing a site’s hierarchy and indexing information. Google needs all of this information in order to index your site and determine its relevance.

Using keywords as anchor text might help your site be more easily indexed, but be cautious. Avoid using the same keyword frequently and pay careful attention to your anchor text ratio. Keyword stuffing your internal links can lower your site’s ranking with penalties. Here’s an example of keyword stuffing:

How To Create Anchor Text for External Links

External links are both links from your site to another site and links from another site to your site. Both of these types of links are important sources of information to Google and to users. 

When linking to another site, link only to trustworthy and reliable sources of information. The document or site you link to should provide value to your customers. 

Anchor text should be relevant to your page and the page you link to. For example, if you are quoting and linking to definitions, use the source of the definitions as anchor text. For example:

Be sure to link to the page you are referencing, not the site’s homepage. This is important in every area of your site, including your blog. Google determines and ranks the relevance and credibility of all your target links.

Backlinks

The external links that influence your ranking the most are backlinks from other sites to yours. When reliable, high-ranking sites link to yours, they are giving authority to your site. This improves your site’s ranking. If these sites are not credible and relevant to the linked page, these links can harm your site’s ranking. 

The natural way to get backlinks is to earn them by standing out as trustworthy, relevant, and reliable. Here are some other ways you can create high-quality backlinks:

• Directories
• Niche-specific blog posts
• Niche-specific blog comments
• Profile links
• Forum Signatures
• Giving Donations
• Sponsorships

These backlinks are ranked according to their relevance to your industry and the reliability of the linking site. The anchor text you use to create backlinks can have a big impact on your ranking.

Be careful in using exact keyword match anchor text when creating backlinks. Using too many keywords can cause Google to suspect spamming and lower your site’s ranking.

FACT: 66.31% of pages have no backlinks. Generally speaking, the more backlinks a page has, the more organic traffic it gets from Google. (Ahrefs)

Types of Anchor Text

SEO best practice is to vary anchor text for all links. Here are some different types of anchor text that can be used for both internal links and backlinks. 

• Branded
• Generic
• Naked
• Image
• Keyword Variations
• Brand plus Keyword
• Partial Match
• Exact Match

Branded: 

Branded anchor text is a good way to backlink to your site. If your brand name is “Elysium Properties,” use “Elysium Properties” as anchor text.

• An example of using a brand name as anchor text is: “You can find your home at Elysium Properties.” 

Generic:

Generic anchor text is generally a call-to-action (CTA). Examples of CTAs used as anchor text are: “click here”, “here”, and “this website”. Here is an example of a CTA link:

Naked:

Naked anchor text uses a raw URL to backlink to your site. You might include the raw URL in a list of relevant sites when you write a guest blog post. Alternately, you might include the raw URL as anchor text in your forum signature. 

Naked anchor text used in a signature might look like this: 

Jason Alexander

jasonalexander.com

Image:

The ALT text used to describe an image can be used as anchor text. A good way to create a backlink to your site is to design an effective infographic, use it in a post, and link to your site from it. Infographics are successful in marketing because they simplify data and make it easier to understand and retain. Here is an example of ALT text:

Google uses ALT text to understand an image. When using an image, be sure to write the ALT text in a way that both describes the image and is relevant to the content on the page. Writing ALT text carefully can increase your ranking and drive more traffic to your site.

Keyword Variations:

Using different variations of a target keyword can diversify your anchor text and drive relevant traffic to your site. Some examples using the keyword “anchor text” are:

• Learn more about anchor text.

• What is the anchor text ratio?

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Brand plus Keyword:

Using your brand and a keyword is another way you can use a keyword to efficiently backlink and help your ranking. A good way to use your brand with a keyword is to include this anchor text in a blog post comment.

A link with anchor text using the brand “Genevieve” with the target keyword “snack” might look like this:

• “Find your favorite snack at Genevieve fine foods.”

Partial Match:

Partial match anchor text is similar to keyword variation. The difference is that you are adding phrases around your target keyword. The phrases you use should be generic. An example of a partial match anchor text using the keyword “lawnmower”:

• “You can learn more about this great lawnmower at HomeSaver.com.”

Exact Match:

Exact match anchor text was once the best way to create backlinks. Google now examines anchor text closely, and using exact matches of target keywords can cause penalties. Use this less frequently than other types of anchor text. Using exact match anchor text, the above example with the keyword “lawnmower” would look like this:

• “You can learn more about this great lawnmower at HomeSaver.com.”

What is Anchor Text Ratio?

Anchor text ratio is the term used to describe the distribution of various types of anchor text used in links. Here’s a graphic from moz for reference:

The best way to find a niche-specific anchor text ratio is to use an SEO marketing tool to analyze the anchor text of the top SERPs in your niche. However, there are some basic guidelines to follow. Here are some basic guidelines to anchor text ratio in your backlink profile.

Homepage:

As far as Google is concerned, your homepage is important for brand building. Google interprets backlinks to your homepage as confidence in your brand’s reliability and trustworthiness. 

Roughly 80%-95% of backlink anchor text should be brand, naked, or generic anchor text. Up to 10% should be keyword variations, brand plus keyword, or partial match anchor text. Up to 5% should be an exact match anchor text. 

• Branded, Naked, Generic: 80%-95%
• Keyword variations, Brand plus keyword, Partial match: Up to 10%
• Exact Match: Up to 5%

Inner Pages:

Google learns about inner pages through backlink anchor text as well as internal anchor text. A good breakdown of backlink anchor text ratio for an inner page places a bit of extra emphasis on descriptive words. 

35%-45% of backlink anchor text should use brand, naked, or generic anchor text. 50%-60% should incorporate keyword variations, brand plus keyword, or partial match anchor text. Up to 10% should be linked with exact match anchor text. 

• Branded, Naked, Generic: 35%-45%
• Keyword variations, Brand plus keyword, Partial match: 50%-60%
• Exact Match: Up to 10%

Overall:

As a general rule, the majority of your backlinks should link directly to your homepage (around 70-80%). This method helps Google see your backlink profile as natural. Creating your backlinks in this way also drives traffic primarily to your homepage, where users can see an overview of your business and what you offer.

Using Images as Anchor Text

When using an image as anchor text, write your image’s ALT as you would any anchor text. Be sure you write it in the type of anchor text you wish to use while keeping it descriptive and informative. 

An example of the ALT on an infographic about chocolate chip cookie recipe is seen below. You’ll see the good alt text vs. the not-so-good:

Anchor Text html

Simple anchor text html consists of three basic parts: 

1. Anchor Tags: a, /a 
2. Hyperlink Target Destination: href=”destination name.domain”
3. Anchor Text: “anchor text example”

If you would like to learn about html coding or anchor text html in particular, HTML.COM offers html coding for beginners and examples of html coding for anchors.

Diib®: Fine-tune Your Anchor Text Today!

The meaning to anchor text and how to correctly use it can be confusing. Hopefully, you’ve learned a bit about it in the article. Diib has worked with thousands of companies, in part, to fine tune their anchor text game. Our analytical software was designed to track your anchor text campaign and notify you of any adjustment you need to make to increase your effectiveness. Some of the other features you’ll love are:

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