Continuing our discussion of things you should be doing right now to improve your blog, today’s tip is:
7. Interlink your posts
Another task that I try to do on a regular basis (not as regularly as I should!) is going back through old posts in my archives and looking for opportunities to interlink them.
Many times bloggers write multiple posts on their blog on related topics, and each one is an opportunity to interlink relevant content. This benefits your readers, as you give them further reading on the topic, and helps with your search rankings (internal links help your SEO a little).
Pay particular attention to opportunities to link to your own products in older posts—this can be a money spinner.
Do you regularly go back and interlink old posts?
I can’t say that I’ve done this. I do have a few blogs (some old; some new). I do find myself, at times, going to update links already there but I’ve never considered going back and linking them the way you have described. Good idea!
Darren,
Absolutely, interlinking is a must. Decreases bounce, increases time on site, helps SEO and most of all gives someone who LIKES your stuff as much of a chance to find more of it as possible.
Really what is NOT to like about interlinking!
I use the interlink into older articles (only on certain articles), this can allow an increase in page view. Thank you mr. Darren for this little article, this article easy to understand and simple.
Linking to previous posts has always seemed natural for new articles on the same topic. Why try to summarize when the magic of linking can give the reader the whole article? What isn’t as easy to remember it to go back to the old articles and “link forward” to the new article.
Since I’m obsessed with seeing whether people actually spend time on a page, a link (if they click it) also gives Google analytics a way to tell me how much time a reader has spent on a page (and without leaving my site). And, as you say, interlinked posts improve SEO.
Interlinking can get even more advanced, as I’m sure you know, Darren. You can structure interlinking in a “silo” of related articles so that link juice checks in but it doesn’t check out. I first read about it at Traffic Generation Cafe in a apiece on blog structure. (Would type the link but think that makes the comment bounce.) I’m trying that now on my blog.
Interlinking makes sense and it gives you better understanding of your own postings.
Not only does it do that, it also helps create a path for search engines to index.
I’ve done this with some of my newer posts, but I didn’t really think much about going back to older ones to try to interlink them. Thanks for the suggestion!
I use a plugin for this on WordPress and it makes it easy, and I can see from my analytics that it is worth doing (as Darren says).
There are lots of plugins to do this, but the one I settled on is http://www.microkid.net/wordpress/related-posts/ which I like because it lets me choose how it works, and has a simple and effective search for finding related posts.
Mark (in London)
Thanks for that great suggestion.
I hear Google love more interconnectivity within your own blog posts and site content, but it’s very positive for readers and users too, so very much a win-win situation.
Presumably you just hyperlink certain relevant keywords in one early post to later content or products? Or do you ever actually edit, amend or rewrite some of the original content?
Internal linking helps a lot in many ways..
1) Decrease bounce rate
2) Bots crawl more pages
3) If used proper anchor text, helps in boosting ranking
If you are on WordPress, here are two plugins which can be life saver:
1) Seo smart link
2) WordPress insight plugin.
Thanks for posting this. While I have blogged quite a bit on the past through a company blog, I just started my own. I always wondered about interlinking past blog posts, and always did it because it seemed like the right thing to do. However having hard evidence definitely helps.
My blog is in its second day of publish (not even on Google yet), and in my second post I naturally linked to my first post. Maybe its my history writing background, but I feel that if you ever reference anything, it should always be cited. Glad to know I’m doing the right thing!
Thanks for the awesome, straightforward, and informative posts, I looking forward to tomorrow’s tip!
I don’t specifically go back to interlink, but when I check my stats and find people reading older posts I then use that opportunity to link the older posts with newer relevant posts.
I definitely try to interlink my posts as much as I can. I especially do this when I feel a post didn’t get as much attention as it should have. Great advice.
Also look at interlinking blog posts with the relative content on your pages (if you use pages also). Many business websites (non exclusive bloggers) wil have a blog as a part of their business website, and a lot of those pages have great authority.
So if you interlink them with your blog posts also, you will find a greater user experience, and SEO benefits as Darren points out, oh and that includes the content in any .pdf documents you may distribute. If they are public they will also be well indexed.
Cheers
Steve
Another thought – does anybody set this up as a campaign in GA? If so, what do you use as your campaign name and medium?
I started interlinking my posts about two months ago and I think it would be wise to go through older posts and do the same thing.
It really helps with keeping bounce rates down.
I haven’t heard that one. Has it been very noticeable? I will try and pay attention on my next site to see if I notice the same.
Completely agree, about internally linking your old posts, however I would warn against going back over your old post & placing external links which aren’t nofollow as these could be construed by Google as paid for links. The Express (paper) did this not so long ago & it cause them major ranking issues. In regards to related post plugin this is an excellent plugin, however remember link in content carry more weight & are more likely to be click on according to research. This plugin http://www.prelovac.com/vladimir/wordpress-plugins/seo-smart-links is defiantly worth a look but don’t overcook the sauce.
I’m a big fan of internal linking, particularly from older blog posts as they are aged and often have good PR, so can helped newer pages rank. There is a good WordPress Plugin called ‘SEO Smart Links’ which automates it. Very useful
Very good point. I like to link by age as well.
I personally think it’s always better to manually create your own links than use any WP Plugin (sure plugin can help you do it easily). But when you do it manually you will know what article to link and what keywords to use.
After Starting Interlinking My Blogs Bounce Rate has come down and i use the SEO Smart Links Plugin in my wordpress blog for interlinking the posts.
I’ve never really tried this, cause I almost always remember it, ten days too late. Must paste a note while writing a draft, so I’ll actually include it in my future posts.
Interlinking is essential for decreasing your site’s bounce rate for sure, though it’s something I didn’t start doing until later on in my blogging antics.
Darren, I have found this technique very useful. Specially when I do write long post. I split it either in 2 or 3 parts and then give each post link to each other. Thank You for optimizing information ;-)
Try linking your content by date starting with the homepage and then going to a category and then going by date within the category with the final post heading back to the homepage. Another good way to take advantage of internal link building
Internal link building is a great way to take advantage of your own site-building leverage. One strategy, that I like, is to sort your blogs under a parent category. Have your home page point a link to that category, then have each post link to the previous post in the category. Have the oldest post in the category link back to the homepage. This creates a full circle of links for the search engine to follow on your page.
I’m just going back right now to my neglected post and updating old posts with links to new ones. This is a very relevant post for me since I run a weight loss blog and since starting it I’ve tried new things and luckily gotten (good!) results, so I think I should update old posts to reflect that – a lot of people land on the old posts as first-time visitors, and I want them to know what happened since writing that posts :)