Internal Links Vs. External Links: What’s The Difference?

Summary: While both internal and external links play vital roles in SEO, their functions differ. Internal links guide users and search engines within your website, boosting navigation and distributing authority. External links, pointing to relevant external sources, enhance credibility and visibility. For detailed information, read till the end.

What has been updated from the old blog post:

• A comparison table of internal and external links added.
• Subheads modified.

While both internal and external links serve different purposes, they are equally crucial for your website. You must discern their differences and use them for the right strategies, including search engine optimization.

Additional Read: What is SEO

This blog post examines the significant differences between internal and external links, as well as their key advantages and practical applications for enhancing the user experience or increasing the website’s authority.

What Are Internal Links?

 

Internal links are hyperlinks that connect one web page to another within the same domain or website. They play an essential role in helping users and search engine crawlers navigate the website effectively, while also establishing a logical hierarchy of content across the site. By using tools like Ahrefs, website owners can identify valuable internal linking opportunities to enhance SEO. Best practices for internal linking include placing links in menus, footers, and body text, ensuring that users and search engines can easily access relevant pages within the same website.

What Are External Links?

External links, also known as outbound links, are hyperlinks that connect a webpage to another page or website on a different domain. These links are used to direct users to external resources, provide additional information, or support claims made within the content. External links are important for SEO as they can help establish the credibility of your content by referencing authoritative sources, enhancing user experience, and improving the overall relevance of your page.

Difference Between Internal and External Links

For a quick comparison, refer to the table mentioned below.

Benefits of Internal and External links in SEO

Internal and external links are both important for search engine optimization, and brands should pay special attention to links because they are one of the most important SEO ranking signals.

Let’s dive in and understand the importance of Internal and External links in SEO –

Benefits of Internal Linking in SEO

• Improve Site Navigation – Internal links improve site navigation, enabling users to move between pages to satisfy their queries. Let’s say a user lands on a blog post on “Search Engine Optimization.” You may use internal links here to add relevant posts like “types of SEO,” “Enterprise SEO,” “Off-page SEO,” “SEO Copywriting,” etc.
• Indexing and Crawling – Links guide crawlers to find content on the internet, and internal links enable these crawlers to find and access various pages within your website. Simply put, internal links increase crawl depth and minimize the chances of having an orphan page on the website. This further ensures that all the pages are crawled and indexed, enabling users to find them on search results.
• Page Authority/Link Juice – Internal links pass link juice and authority from high-authority pages to other pages within your site [from hub to spoke/sub-pages]. When you link from a strong page to a weaker page, it can then pass the link juice to the linked page.

Benefits of External Links in SEO

Linking to external, authoritative sources enhances the value of the information you provide. For instance, if you are quoting a fact, study, or statistic, adding a link to the attributing site gives you credibility, not just in the eyes of the users but also in the eyes of search engines. The same link acts as a backlink for the linked website, and this, in turn, increases its credibility in the eyes of search engines.

Since links are what make the web and web crawlers follow them to find content, external links demonstrate that you’re part of the web and not just a dead end. Also, since links are one of the most important SEO ranking signals, it is pertinent to focus on these links.

Link Attributes and SEO Signals

If you want to link to other sites and your own smartly, you need to know what link attributes are. Not all links are good for SEO, so it’s important to use them wisely.

Key points:

• Dofollow vs Nofollow: Dofollow links give the page they go to link equity (SEO value), but nofollow links tell search engines not to send authority. Use dofollow for links that are important to your site and to other sites. If you paid for a link, it came from a source you don’t trust, or it was made by a user (UGC), use nofollow.
• Sponsored & UGC links: Mark paid links with rel=”sponsored” and community content with rel=”ugc” to comply with Google’s guidelines.
• Anchor text: For both internal and external links, use anchor text that is descriptive and has a lot of keywords. If you don’t want to get in trouble, don’t use too many exact-match anchors.
• Link hierarchy: Put the pages with the most SEO value at the top of your list of links. When internal links have the right anchor text, search engines can find and rank high-priority pages more easily.

The Best Ways to Use Technical Links

It will be easy for both people and search engines to get around your site if you make sure that the technical parts of your links are as good as they can be.

Key points:

• Link placement: For the best SEO results, put links in the main part of your page instead of in footers or sidebars.
• Crawl depth: Search engines should be able to find and index important pages from the homepage in just 2–3 clicks.
• URL structure: Use clear, descriptive URLs for links on your site and other sites to help search engines understand it and get more clicks.
• Internal vs. external markup: In HTML, use tags to make sure your internal links work right. Also, make sure that when you need to, external links open in new tabs (target=”_blank”).

Link Auditing & Maintenance

Regular audits make sure that your plan for linking to other pages and sites is still good for your SEO and the experience of your users.

Important points:

• Audit internal links: You can use Screaming Frog, Ahrefs, or SEMrush to find broken links, pages that don’t have any links to them, and links that go too deep.
• Audit external links: In external links, look for 404 errors, broken pages, or URLs that have been redirected. If you want to keep your credibility, get rid of or fix broken links.
• Monitor anchor text distribution: Make sure that the anchor text for internal links is unique and works well with the keywords. Don’t use too many keywords that are exactly the same.
• Fix broken or redirected links: Repair links that don’t work or take you to the wrong page. Use 301 redirects for pages that have moved and change the anchor text to show the new URLs.

Link Strategy & Site Architecture

A well-planned link strategy improves your website’s SEO, authority, and navigation.

Important points:

• To share link equity, make a list of pages in order of importance and link from pages with a lot of authority to new or important pages.
• As part of your external linking strategy, you should link to other sites that are relevant and trustworthy. Stay away from spammy sites that could hurt your SEO rankings.
• Getting the right mix of links from inside and outside your site is important. Too many external links that don’t add anything to the content can hurt SEO.
• Content clusters: Group related content together by linking to it from other pages on your site. This will boost your site’s authority and its chances of ranking for those topics.

How Linking Affects the Experience of the User

Links are important for more than just SEO. They also make it easier for people to find their way around your site and improve the overall user experience (UX).

Important points:

• Good internal linking makes it easier for users to find the right pages, which keeps them on your site longer and lowers bounce rates.
• Mobile responsiveness: Make sure that links are easy to find and click on when using a smartphone. Most people now use smartphones to browse the web.
• Links should be put where they help the content and help people navigate the site in a way that makes sense.
• Links that tell people what to do (CTA): Use internal links as calls to action (CTAs) in a smart way to get people to buy things, sign up for your newsletter, or go to product pages.

Best Practices For Internal And External Linking

By adhering to these best practices, you can enhance the authority and credibility of your content, improve user experience, and ensure that your internal and external links remain valuable and relevant over time. Leveraging effective internal links strategies is essential to create a seamless site structure, helping search engines and users navigate through your content efficiently. Effective hyperlink optimization SEO can strengthen both your internal and external linking strategies, driving better results in search engine rankings.

External Links

• Use the Correct Anchor Text – Choose an anchor text that correctly demonstrates the information users and crawlers will find when they are directed to another web page. This maintains relevance because users and bots follow with intent.
• Maintain a Balanced Link Structure – Steer clear of stuffing too many links onto one page or too many links in one short paragraph. You must also ensure that you do not include two different internal links on the same anchor text.
• Prioritize Contextual Relevance – Make sure the links are contextually relevant to the surrounding discussion and benefit the reader from clicking on them. Do not include random or unrelated links that can divert users or obscure the purpose of the content.

External Links

• Link to Authoritative Sources – Choose reliable, trustworthy websites relevant to your content when including links to external sources.
• Use Relevant Anchor Text – For your external links, pick contextually relevant anchor texts. This helps users and bots to understand the context of the external link.
• Open in a New Tab (If Possible) – External links direct users to a different website, so you should set the link to open in a new tab or window. By ensuring that your website is always available, you lower the chances of users getting lost or leaving your site altogether.
• Monitor Link Quality – Review and update the quality and relevance of the external websites you link to your content. To preserve the credibility and value of your information, try to update or eliminate any links that are no longer relevant or trustworthy.
• Follow the Right Link Attributes – You must note that external links are of multiple types, including dofollow links, nofollow links, sponsored links, etc. Thus, you must use the right link attribute for the external links you have added to your content.

Additional Read: Types of Backlinks You Need To Know

Link-Building – An Important SEO Strategy

This concludes everything you need to know about internal and external links, including what best practices you must follow to make them work. By now, you have learned that while external links contribute to authority, credibility, visibility, and user experience, internal links aid in website structure, indexing, authority distribution, etc.

Please remember that internal and external links are crucial to devising an effective SEO strategy. You need expert guidance to carry out link-building activities effectively.

Techmagnate is a premium SEO agency in Delhi. If you’d like to build such an effective strategy, contact Techmagnate for SEO services.