Do You Vary Anchor Text in Your Search Engine Optimization Efforts?

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February 8, 2008

Do You Vary Anchor Text in Your Search Engine Optimization Efforts?

A Search Engine Watch Forums thread asks whether it's useful (or detrimental) to vary your anchor text. Should anchor text be differentiated?

The answer is yes. As AussieWebmaster says, "always vary your anchor text."

Is there a sweet spot? Not really. But what you should do is make sure that the anchor text is well optimized (you can use a thesaurus, for example, to find other reasonable search terms) and that you're not too spammy. The links should look natural, not unnatural.

Forum discussion continues at Search Engine Watch Forums.

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posted Tamar Weinberg in Link Building at February 8, 2008 9:14 AM Comments (5)

Comments

It is important to mix up your link anchor text, as the search engines will see too much repetition as being unnatural and contrived.

Posted by Jacques Snyman at February 8, 2008 09:56

The Slightly Shady SEO blog had a really nice example of how to vary your anchor text. He provides a matrix that can be used for any keyword variation.

http://www.slightlyshadyseo.com/?p=119

Posted by Brent at February 8, 2008 10:43

If your anchors from a hundred different sites is the same, you may raise some flags with the search engines. Also if you vary your anchor terms you can improve your ranking for a variety of keywords

Posted by No Name at February 10, 2008 16:28

The more you differentiate your anchor text, the more keyword phrase links you are generating. Significant help in longtail searches.

Posted by Steve at February 10, 2008 23:07

Hey... I posted that thread. :D

Thanks for the answers guys. I was making sure I was on the right path in developing an equitable link chart for our network.

Posted by tshears at February 11, 2008 17:41