Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
What is the difference between anchor text and external links?
-
I understand you 'Pro's' may fins this a silly question. But I'm a visual learner and I can't seem to grasp this.
I've read the pages MOZ has provided on anchor text and external links and my question is, how are they different? And which one is more important to seo? Can someone who has a great ability to simplify things, please help me understand this. They seem very similar to me but, I know there has to be more to it.
External links: External Links are hyperlinks that point at (target) any domain other than the domain the link exists on (source)
**Anchor Text: **Anchor text is the visible characters and words that hyperlinks display when linking to another document or location on the web.
Thanks is advance, Lauren.
-
Hahaha, yeah, not my personal choice of reading material, either.
-
That helps me a lot, I get why I would use the word 'Study', because it does look like i'm sending them to an insurance home page. Which isn't as interesting as a study ( Or at least as interesting as an insurance study can be.. ) Yawn.
-
When I say "put the link around" I mean "use these words as anchor text," if that wasn't clear from context.
-
Oh! Sorry, I was looking at the wrong link. Yeah, that looks fine.
Personally, my preference would be to put the link around the words "a study" or "a study by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners," because only having the link around "National Association of Insurance Commissioners" may lead readers to think the link goes to the NAIC homepage rather than the study. What you've done, though, is entirely acceptable.
-
Sorry, I didn't explain that well. The anchor text I created takes you to another domain: http://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/homeowners-and-renters-insurance from my domain.
Here's the text from the blog, with the anchor text in it:
According to a study by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), the average homeowner’s insurance premium rose by 6.0 percent in 2013, following a 5.7 percent rise in 2012. The average renter’s insurance premium was unchanged in 2012, after rising 1.1 percent the previous year.
Here's the url to the blog: http://thumannagency.com/blog/05-05-2016/3778
Sorry if i'm not saying this correctly...
-
Sure.
That's one entirely legitimate way to do it. If it were me, though, I'd do something along the lines of:
The Thumann Agency has been proudly serving families and businesses in Dallas for over 20 years.
In HTML, that would look like:
The Thumann Agency has been proudly serving families and businesses in Dallas for over 20 years.
That said, neither may actually be necessary. Since it's a blog post on your own site, the site's own navigation makes it pretty easy to find your homepage.
-
Would you be so kind as to tell me if I've done this correctly, this is my first attempt at using anchor text in my blog.
Any helpful criticism would be greatly appreciated.
http://thumannagency.com/blog/05-05-2016/3778 The link is down towards the bottom of the page.
-
Well, this is the place for 'em. Feel free to post a thread whenever you need to! Welcome to the Moz community. ^_^
(One tip: If a response answers your question, click the "Good Answer" link in the lower-right. It marks your question as "answered," and it gives the responder a few extra MozPoints. I work here, so I'm not too concerned, but it's a good thing to do.)
-
Hallelujah!!!! Thank you for that. A good teacher is one that knows how to simplify and now, without a doubt, I can say I understand it.
I may have a few more questions for you now..
-
Hi there, Lauren!
An external link is one typeof hyperlink—specifically, a hyperlink that links from one domain to another. The opposite is an internal link, which links from one page on a domain to another page on that same domain. A link from a-moz.groupbuyseo.org to inbound.org is an external link because a-moz.groupbuyseo.org and inbound.org are different domains, but a link from a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q to a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q/what-is-the-difference-between-anchor-text-and-external-links is internal because they're both on the domain a-moz.groupbuyseo.org.
Anchor text is a component of all text links, whether they're internal or external. In a traditional hyperlink that appears on the page as a bit of underlined blue text, the anchor text is that blue text itself.
This is an internal link to a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q. The destination URL is a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q, and the anchor text is "This is an internal link to a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q." It's internal because both the page we're currently on and the page the link points to are on the domain a-moz.groupbuyseo.org. Here's another link to a-moz.groupbuyseo.org/community/q: The Moz Q&A Forum. It has the same destination URL as the previous link, but the anchor text—"The Moz Q&A Forum"—is different.
Does that clear things up at all?
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Adding external links to other businesses
Hi,
Link Building | | LisaBabblebird
I'm looking to add some external links to a website. The homepage has a section showing the logos of clients the company has worked with. Is it worth making these logos links to the clients websites? Some of the clients are household names. However, I've noticed that very few websites do this. Would it add any value?0 -
If I disavow bad links on "disavow link webmaster" will they still show up on my moz reports?
We recently found out we have a lot of bad links linking back to our website from spam sites, I disavowed them through the google disavow link webmaster. On my moz report it still shows the links, is that normal?
Link Building | | Ryan.Cruz0 -
Backlinks vs External Links vs Referral Links vs Outbound links
Hello all, I was just wondering if you could explain the difference between all the links above? I'm confused as they all seem to be the same or similar and I would just like to clearly know what distinguishes them from eachother. Thanks for your help, Jayne
Link Building | | NCOREGSEO0 -
Does an external link to an image file on my site help my SEO?
I found a few websites that are displaying images from my site. Curiously, they have also linked these images to the source image file on my website. I found these because Moz showed these sites in my list of backlinks. I assume that means it impacts my Domain Authority. But does this actually help me in search engines since it's not linking to a page on my site?
Link Building | | AlexLenhoff0 -
Do footer links pass less link juice?
One of my best inbound links for PA and DA happens to be a footer link, curious if it's less valuable or has any value at all.
Link Building | | Theskimonster0 -
Remove links or change anchor text?
I am currently in the process of cleaning up the link profile for a website that has been hit by Penguin thanks to loads of links from free directories with exact match keyword anchor texts (about 200 root domains from total of 300 root domains). I was wondering whether it's best to remove these un-natrual keyword anchor text links altogether, or change the anchor texts to brand (domain name, domainname.com, www.domainname.com, http://www.domainname.com)? I am currently trying to remove these links but was thinking it would be quicker to get to a healthier link profile (in terms of brand/commercial anchor text split) by altering the anchor texts and not removing them. Some of these directories are the worst of the worst on the other hand. Also note that I'm only really getting about a 30% response rate from the owners of these directories. Any thoughts? Many thanks in advance.
Link Building | | ec9awp0 -
Do links within imbeddable widgets carry link juice?
I'm dipping my toes into infographic design. On of my desired outcomes is to gain links by having other sites embed my graphic. I'm considering using Tableau's interactive data visualization software to do so; thus creating a widget, embedding it on my blog, and including the embed code for others to post. Is it possible to include a juice passing link in such an infographic? I know its possible to include links inside the tableau graphic but not sure if they have straight SEO value. If these links are not juice passing would it be better to go with a simple image link that passes value?
Link Building | | JesseCWalker1