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Anchors Away! Your Link Said What?

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external link anchor text, link buildingI’m not going to take up all kinds of time and go over what anchor text is in this post. However, I am going to give you a suggestion with regards to link anchor text and how it relates to building relationships. Holy wow that was a long sentence. 🙂

Link Anchor Text

Uhm, I know I said I wasn’t going to go over this,  but I kind of have to. Now you know that I have no real game plan when it comes to writing up a post! Anchor text is the clickable text within your posts.

It is this text that shows the search engines the relevancy between the post and where you are sending them. So it’s important from an internal linking standpoint that you connect your pages in a relevant manner. You all know this right?!

External Anchor Text Links

I have one huge suggestion for you here. I am beginning to do this with all of my posts and I think it will help you, me, all of us. This simple tip can help forge great partnerships and relationships with other bloggers if done correctly.

We all want other bloggers to link to us. We want to be an authoritative presence out there, so links are huge for search engines to see. We all desire relevant, seo optimized links pointing back to us. How do we accomplish this goal when we link out to others?

Simple. ASK THE BLOG OWNER. Nine times out of ten, you can simple email the blog owner, let them know you are linking to one of their posts and ask them if they have an anchor text they prefer you use as the link.

If you get no response, what I have been doing is using their slug as the anchor text. If you need more information on slugs, you can read this article below.

Benefits of Asking

What are the  benefits of asking? Building a relationship with other bloggers is my number one pick. It’s networking people. Besides that, it gets your name out there to people who possibly have never heard of you. I know…people NOT hearing of you?! Crazy.

This technique is a win-win for everybody. You get noticed by others and they get a link with the exact text they want to rank for. And talk about respect? In my opinion, 🙂 blog owners are more likely to respect people that come to them and say, “hey..I’m gonna link to your genius article, what anchor text should I use?”

So far, I have had pretty good luck with this practice. I am just beginning this step in my reaching out campaign. I think it is the best thing to do for all parties involved. And if you are feeling really special and jiggy, do what Ana Hoffman just did in a recent post. She gave you the anchor text to use if you link to the post! Genius.

The Bottom Line

Now, I have said it before…I’m no genius and this ain’t rocket science folks. This is not some major underground tactic to build relationships and relevant links. It’s a simple, easy to accomplish task that will help you in optimizing your links and anchor text.

I am reaching out to more people now than ever before because I am following my own advice. And because I am linking to them with the anchor text they want…they have a mutual respect for me as well. And who knows, maybe one day when I need a blogging favor, I can call on one of them! So go for it, grab the great relationship at the same time you are using SEO best practices.

Okay. Your turn now. How do you determine your external link anchor text? Will you implement this tip?

Feel free to share the goodness and pass along to your friends.

Comments (39)

  • I think asking bloggers what their preferred anchor text is really polite practice. It not only earns you respect as a person but it provides you with many opportunities to widen your network that is anchored on a genuine sense of community. I hope this also permeates as easily in the real world and not just in the virtual world.

    Just my thoughts…
    Georgina of http://www.spurpress.com

    Reply
  • What a breath of fresh air, to receive a polite message requesting what anchor text I’d prefer would certainly make me remember the person and hopefully get a chance to return the favor. I’m going to start adopting this straight away. Thanks for the tip…

    Reply
  • Really interesting, something so simple yet so effective!

    Just tried it out, lets wait and see how it goes 🙂

    Reply
  • Hi, I used to make the link look like “click here now” and all that jazz. Now I know the importance of the links, how Google is looking at it and how it can overall improve your blog. Thanks for that tip.

    Reply
  • Hey Lisa,

    What I do is usually make my anchor text the name of the site, like if I were to link to you in passing it would be “The Friendly Blogger” but sometimes I do get specific and would use a link such as “here’s a story about Link Anchor Text”

    But, I like the idea of using this tactic more as a “get your name out there” idea.

    Thanks for the post.

    Brandon

    Reply
  • Hi Lisa,

    This is one of those DOH! moments. Being a small blogger (I was overjoyed at 33 page views the other day, lol) it never would have occurred to me to dare contact a blogger with an established site I admired.

    I suppose it’s like any other aspect of being classy: It won’t matter how green you are if you show everyone you are conscientious and have good manners.

    I’m going to try this!
    Delena

    Reply
    • Author

      Hi Delena:

      You should be very proud of that! It’s growth and form of growth is success (unless its some unsightly thing between the toes) 🙂
      I think if we put ourselves out there in front of people, they are forced to see us and HEAR us. Whether they take action or not is up to them, but at least we can say we put ourselves front and center in their world!

      Cheers,
      Lisa

      Reply
  • Wow, what a simple, yet huge tip! Asking the blog owner for their anchor text. You can’t see me, but I’m slapping my forehead right now.

    Reply
  • Most posts display the keywords at the end of the post or (tags) and in this case using one of them normally would suffice as well. Like for this article I would have used your ‘link building’ as anchor text based on your tags.

    From my experience most bloggers are so happy to get mention and a backlink they aren’t choosy about ‘anchor text’ if you choose something different anyhow.

    Reply
    • Author

      Justin:

      Nice to see you again and I couldn’t agree more about being mentioned. I think maybe more for a relationship building tactic we can seek out what anchor text they are trying to rank for. I can’t say I get answers all the time, but at least I give them the opportunity to let me know what they want!

      All the best,
      Lisa

      Reply
  • Hi Lisa, This is good even for novices and written in a way we can follow.
    I’ve read through the links you provided for more reading and started at the bottom.
    Then I went to my blog and linked every post internally (no, I hadn’t done this before). Boring but satisfying work.
    Shows how you can’t presume that all of your readers know even the basics !

    Thanks a lot for the illumination.

    Reply
  • Hi Lisa,
    First time here, what a great blog Ana was right.
    I had never thought of contacting the blog owner for their anchor text, what a great idea. I like you try to schedule my posts in advance, normally write a weeks worth Sunday night or Monday. So this could work for me.
    Some Genius advise. Thanks.
    Pete

    Reply
    • Author

      Welcome to my blog Pete! I appreciate your visit. I hope to be get to the point where I can write a whole week’s worth in one day! That’s fantastic that you do that. I am hoping that giving the blogs I link out to exactly what they want, will help in the long run!

      Stop by anytime Pete!
      Lisa

      Reply
  • Awsome post , makes it quite simple with your lucid style of writing. Since we fall in the same niche, i see myself link my related posts to yours as a trackback 🙂 this is the only exception where the search engines also value an outbound link and there is linking between blogs of similar niche.
    Something like a resonating linkwheel .

    Reply
    • Author

      Exactly Rohan! I appreciate your input and yes, those in the same niche definitely need understand the value of external linking.

      Thanks for stopping by,
      Lisa

      Reply
  • Hi Lisa,

    Your message is simple, if you are going to have a link make it a meaningful link, and all you have to do is to communicate what the anchor text to use. Brilliant, it’s good for SEO and good for relationship building.

    My brother always say, “all you need to do is to ask and stop the guessing”.

    BTW, did you ask Ana for her preferred anchor text? You’ve just used her name.

    Ben Wan

    Reply
    • Author

      LOL Ben..no..I linked to Ana’s “about me” page for general purposes. I think your brother is spot on with his advice! Guessing doesn’t help any of us.

      I appreciate you visiting me!
      Lisa

      Reply
  • BTW nice new blog design, it looks real nice.

    Reply
  • HOLY CRAP!!! You changed your design…like A LOT. I LOVE IT!!!!

    Of course, great suggestion regarding contacting the blog owner.

    Reply
  • Thanks for the mention, Lisa, first of all.

    Secondly, I love your tip about emailing the blog owner and ask them which anchor text they would prefer.

    Way to get noticed by some popular bloggers!

    Ana

    Reply
  • Hi Lisa,
    Wow, what a simple, yet huge tip! Asking the blog owner for their anchor text. You can’t see me, but I’m slapping my forehead right now.

    Thanks for that! (the tip not the forehead slap)
    Peggy

    Reply
  • Hey, Lisa, rocking it gaaaaaaaaaaaaal….

    I always link with anchor text (well 99% of the time) if it is another bloggers post.

    If I am linking to something I don’t care about and adding a no-follow anyway (like FB and Twitter), I don’t care about anchor text.

    I usually don’t contact the blogger cause I usually need the answer yesterday!!! So I look at their page source and see what keyword are they targeting the page with. Then I use that keyword. I might edit it slightly to fit in with my post.

    So that is how I determine it and I will continue using it (most of the time, lol).

    Reply
    • Author

      Hi Brankica:

      Excellent suggestion! I know what you mean about needing it yesterday, so I am trying to “forecast” my posts and plan ahead. Hopefully this will help me in getting responses in time.
      The only issue I have with the source page is that most of the time the meat keywords are just throw away keywords so that the authors can keep there true keywords protected. The ones they want to rank for anyways.
      I love when you come by and visit!

      Lisa

      Reply
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  • Great post, Lisa, I learn so much from you every time I read your stuff…thanks for sharing and if it’s ok, I would like to use your anchor text in a post down the road..take care and see ya again real soon!

    Reply
  • Another great post Lisa and an awesome new design. Love it!

    I really like your idea of asking about the anchor text or using the slug. So simple and yet so powerful. Also a great way to start a new friendship.

    Reply
    • Author

      Thanks Robert. Im all about making it easy. And I love finding new friendships…uh…like you!! I always enjoy your visits Robert.

      All the best,
      Lisa

      Reply

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