How to Use Internal Links in Content for Long Tail SEO

A simple Google search will tell you plenty about how you can bolster your SEO strategy. 

While there’s much info out there about things like framework auditing and data examination through end-user value, there’s one particular aspect of the trade that most people tend to forget about. 

It’s called internal linking.

While the practice is vital to SEO, it’s often overlooked. Given this background, it’s safe to say that internal links are to backlinks what Robin is to Batman. 

In recognition of sidekicks, we have a proposition. Instead of continually drafting blog posts about your brand, how about thinking of how you can give your audience more bang for the buck – more value and insights?

To do this, you simply have to remind yourself to share a link to previous articles you’ve written before by creating an internal link. Not only is this likely going to boost your engagement metrics, but it will also help cement your name as an authority figure in your field. 

If this sounds like something you’re looking to do, we’ve got the low-down on how you can leverage the power of internal linking for your long-tail SEO strategy.

What is Long Tail SEO?

By definition, long-tail SEO refers to a technique for generating high-value organic website traffic. Constitutionally, to implement long-tail SEO, you have to come up with search terms that consist of three or more words. 

Ideally, you also want these search terms to have a lower search volume, competition rate, and cost-per-click. By doing so, you’re bound to realize that you register higher conversion rates than if you had chosen to use short-tail keywords. 

If you were to plot the search volume for long-tail and short-tail keywords on a graph, you’ll be able to come up with a visual that appears to be a tail. This is especially true if you’re taking into account the high search volume of short-tail keywords.

5 Reasons You Need to Use Long-Tail SEO

The numbers show that about 70% of all search traffic emanates from long-tail keywords. 

If you’re looking to have your SEO strategy serve its purpose, then you don’t want to miss out on this great source of traffic. 

That’s not all though, here’s a host of other reasons why you need to consider long-tail SEO:

Connect With Your Audience Faster

Long-tail SEO can help you resonate with your target audience faster than if you were to use short-tail keywords. This is because long-tail keywords emphasize specific intents and actions behind a search. 

Since specificity is key, you want to understand the motivations behind the different keywords your target audience would use. Once you have a good comprehension of this, you’ll find it easier to connect with your clients and offer them the services they need. 

Lower Search Competition

Short-tail keywords tend to point to several directions all at once. Since you want to grow your brand name, it’s better to stray away from this practice and instead choose a more laser-focused approach that has a lower level of competition. 

Not only will you find it easier to compete with other brands in your niche, but you’ll also be making effective use of keywords to get the results you want. Depending on your motivations, examples of actions you aim for include having more sign-ups for your email newsletter increased ebook downloads on your landing page, or more attendees to a webinar you’re hosting. 

Objectively, your long-tail keywords need to feature narrower intents and fewer searches to outrank the competition. 

Better Conversion Rates

Studies have shown that long-tail SEO can enhance your conversation rate to be more than 35 percent. Indeed, this is within the realms of possibility if you’re willing to optimize your website to include relevant search terms that agree with your target audience. 

Since you’ll be competing and ranking for keywords that offer more value to prospective clients, you can expect to see a rise in traffic numbers. Even better, there’s a good chance you’ll be able to guide leads further down your sales funnel. 

Reduced Expenditure

Compared to long-tail keywords, short-tail keywords are quite expensive to run. This is because as a business, you’ll be facing competition from other businesses looking to rank for that keyword. 

If you’re looking to rank highly in search engine results, the sales team will have to make lots of money and time investment to see results. 

On the flip side, long-tail SEO is quite breezy. Not only do you face less competition because you’re ranking for specific intents, but the odds are also that you’re bound to land a higher return on investment (ROI).

Adapting to the Game

Today, voice search is all the rage. 

By implementing long-tail SEO strategies, you stand to pull in bigger audiences. This is because thanks to the power of word of mouth, most voice search users are fond of making long-tail search queries. 

If you choose to ignore this and instead focus on short-tail SEO, then, you’ll miss out on this market demographic. 

Since you register better revenue figures, you should factor in voice search as a source of income. With long-tail keywords, you can better communicate with your target audience.

What are Internal Links?

Internal links are hyperlinks that point to another page on the same domain/website. 

By using links on your website, you make it easy for both users and search engines to find content on your website. 

It’s important to note that there are different kinds of internal links. Other than links you share on your Homepage, Post Feed, or Menu, you can also feature links within your blog content. 

This kind of linking is called contextual. They are quite effective in the current scene because they point users to related and interesting content. Notably, they also facilitate search engines to establish what content on your website is related and weigh the value of content shared. 

By featuring more internal links on a webpage, search engines will take this as a signal that your website has value. Since you want to rank for the right things, you must implement internal linking in your SEO strategy. 

Internal linking is a great idea because:

Having shared this knowledge, you must understand Google divides link value between all the links on a webpage. 

In most instances, the homepage of a website has the most link value because they typically feature more backlinks. Here, the link value is distributed between all the links found on a particular homepage. 

That’s not all though, the link value is passed on to the following page and distributed between the links on a particular page, and so on. 

This knowledge is important if you’re looking to give your new blog posts that push they need to rank highly. 

Instead of just posting them on a category page, why don’t you consider linking to them from the homepage?

Internal Linking Tips

Create Content – Lots of It

The name of the game is numbers. For effective internal linking for long-tail SEO, you need to ensure you have numerous internal pages. 

Before you begin though, you need to think about developing a brilliant content marketing strategy. With the foundation sorted, you can formulate how to implement an internal linking strategy that sells your content. 

If you want to create links to a page from numerous pages, it’s best to use a selection of different linking text. Here, we recommend formulating different keywords for your long-tail SEO. By doing so, you’re injecting a sense of dynamism – a powerful ingredient for businesses looking to project the image of authority figures. 

Descriptive Anchor texts

Let your anchor texts do the talking for you. Ideally, you want them to be descriptive and feature the target keyword of the page you’re linking to. Google loves it when the text features the target keyphrase since it enables it to determine the relevance of the page. 

Since you want your audience to get real value from your content, you need to come up with creative ways to frame your message. Sure, you’ll be using long-tail keywords to pass along a message, but don’t make it so apparent. The text needs to naturally flow and not sound out of place. 

If you’re new to the practice and are having a hard time developing keywords to use in the body text, you can opt to include them as “Related Links” somewhere at the bottom of a page or post. 

Intent

As alluded earlier, just because it’s SEO content doesn’t mean you should dilute the content. Make it informative, indicate how your product or service will help customers solve a problem. 

For this, you need to:

Link Number

While long-tail SEO directly communicates with consumers what you’re selling, you also want to ensure that search engines also understand this. 

For this, we caution not overdoing it with the number of links you put on any page, including the navigation. The sweet spot here is the range of 75-100. Beyond this would be overkill. At the same time, fewer than this means that you’ve not done enough to stand out. 

If you’re relatively new to the practice and haven’t adapted, we suggest making use of a ‘link juice calculator’ during site optimization to swiftly see the number of links and buttons accessible on any page. 

It’s worth documenting that dropdown menus can dilute the SEO value passed on from one page to the next. As such, it’s better to use them cautiously. 

Link Placement

As you find your footing in the internal linking world, we suggest not being over promotional with your practice. You only want to have links where it adds value to readers. If the pages you link to are not related to the post, just don’t link. 

During link placement, context is important. Cognizant of the fact that not all links are created equally, you need to give more priority to in-body links. This is because they tend to be weighted heavily than links found elsewhere in the navigation. 

Proofread

It’s important to note that broken links can be detrimental to your SEO strategy. 

To quickly spot them, we suggest using a platform like a ‘broken link checker’ to rectify such errors.

During editing, you may decide to change the URL of a page. While this may not affect the content much, the links you created may become broken. Unless necessary e.g. when relaunching a website, we recommend that you don’t change URLs.

Conclusion

It’s not rocket science to see role internal linking plays in long-tail SEO. Without internal links, your page won’t rank favorably. 

With a great internal linking strategy, you can demonstrate which content is related and which of your blog pieces offer the most value to customers. 

The pointers shared in this review can help both your users and Google better understand your website. In light of this, we’re confident you’ll find it easier to connect with your audience and rank highly in search results. 

Are you ready to embrace long-tail SEO? What internal linking strategies do you think you’ll start with?

Let us know in the comments below!

Acodez is a leading digital marketing agency in India offering all kinds of digital marketing services which include, SEO, SMM, SEM, Inbound marketing, etc. We are also a web development company giving solutions to businesses in India and abroad. Our broad experience of having worked on numerous projects has helped us know the requirements of the clients and providing the best services to them. For more information, contact us today.