Internal linking for a small website works as a simple system: every page is linked from a hub, every hub links down to its pages, related pages link sideways to each other, and every article links to the service it supports. Use descriptive anchor text, and check regularly that no page is left with nothing pointing to it.
On the Tamou Law Group site we placed 1,004 internal links with a script. Adding that many by hand, across several hundred posts, is the kind of job that never gets done. On Rebalanced by Rita, a Scottsdale aesthetics practice, treatments, the concerns they address, and the cities served are all cross-linked by script, so no page is ever orphaned.
Most small sites do not need a script. They need a rule that is simple enough to follow every time a page is added. This is the one we use.
What is internal linking?
Internal linking is linking one page of a website to another page of the same site. The menu is internal linking, and so is a sentence in a blog post pointing to a service page. These links are how both visitors and search engines move through a site and discover what is on it.
An external link points to someone else's site. You have limited say over who links to you. Internal links are entirely yours, which makes them the cheapest improvement available on most sites.
Why do internal links matter for a small site?
Internal links matter for a small site because search engines find pages by following links, and they read the number and wording of links to a page as a sign of what it is about and how much it matters. A page with nothing pointing to it may never be found.
They matter to people too. A reader who finishes an article about a problem wants the page about the fix. If the link is not there, they go back to the search results and may pick someone else. Small sites often have good pages that are simply unreachable except through the menu.
What is a simple internal linking system?
A simple internal linking system has four rules: hubs link down to every page in their group, each page links back up to its hub, related pages link sideways to each other, and articles link to the service page they support. Applied every time, those four rules connect an entire small site.
| Link type | From | To | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| Down | Hub, such as "Services" | Each service page | Lets everything be found |
| Up | Service page | Its hub | Shows where the page belongs |
| Sideways | A service page | Related services, nearby cities | Keeps the reader moving |
| Supporting | Blog article | The service it relates to | Sends interest to the page that sells |
To put it in place:
- List every page on the site in a spreadsheet.
- Assign each page to one hub.
- Check that each hub links to all of its pages.
- Add two or three sideways links on each page to its closest relatives.
- Go through each article and link it to the one service page it supports.
- Repeat steps two to five whenever a page is added.
What is an orphan page and how do you find one?
An orphan page is a page that exists on a site but has no internal links pointing to it. Visitors cannot reach it by clicking, and search engines may find it only through the sitemap, if at all. Orphans are usually old landing pages or articles published and never linked.
To find them, compare two lists: every page the site contains, from the sitemap or the content system, and every page that a crawl starting from the homepage can reach. Anything on the first list and missing from the second is an orphan. Then decide for each one: link it, merge it into a better page, or remove it. The links report in Search Console also shows which pages have the fewest internal links, as covered in Google Search Console for business owners.
What anchor text should internal links use?
Internal links should use anchor text that describes the page being linked to, in natural words, such as "water heater replacement" for the water heater page. Avoid "click here" and "read more", which tell neither the reader nor a search engine anything about the destination.
Vary it a little. If forty links to one page all use the identical phrase, that is what a machine wrote. Use the name of the thing as it fits the sentence. And link once per page to a given destination, near the first natural mention. A paragraph where every second phrase is underlined is hard to read and helps nobody.
When is it worth placing internal links by script?
Placing internal links by script is worth it when a site has more pages than a person can keep in their head, usually a few hundred, or when pages are generated from data. Below that size, a checklist followed by hand gives better links for less effort.
The Tamou Law Group site has a blog of 552 posts and a set of practice pages those posts should point to. That is the case for an auto-linker. The rules any such script needs are the ones a careful editor follows:
for each article:
for each target page, most specific first:
find the first plain-text mention of its phrases
skip headings, existing links, and the page itself
link it once, then move to the next targetOn Rebalanced by Rita we wrote a specification for each page type before building, and the cross-links between treatments, concerns, and cities are placed by script. The links come from the data, so they cannot be forgotten. That is the same thinking behind programmatic SEO for local service businesses.
A script places links quickly and it places mistakes just as quickly. Review a sample before running it across everything.
Frequently asked questions
How many internal links should a page have?
There is no correct number. Link wherever a reader would plausibly want to go next, and stop there. A typical article might carry a handful. A hub page carries as many as it has children.
Do links in the menu and footer count?
They count as links, and they are how most pages get found. Links inside the body text carry more context, because the sentence around them says what the destination is about. Use both. Do not rely on the menu alone.
Should every blog post link to a service page?
Nearly always. An article exists to help someone with a question related to what you sell. If no service page fits, either the article is off topic or a service page is missing.
Do internal links need to open in a new tab?
No. Leave them opening in the same tab. Visitors can open a new tab themselves if they want one.
If you would like to know which of your pages nothing links to, send us the site and we will crawl it and tell you. Links work best pointing at pages built as described in how to write service pages that rank.