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A Definitive Guide To WordPress Blog Links

A Definitive Guide To WordPress Blog Links

WordPress Blog Links

One of the most essential components of blogging are links. They are crucial to keeping your network and visibility alive in a digital ocean. As it stands, there are many different kinds of links when it comes to blogging, each has its own purpose but in this WordPress blog links guide, we’ll cover the most common ones you’ll come across or have to use.

Most of these are necessary for your blogging if you want it to grow and become successful. A link, by definition, is a clickable reference to information within a written text. Hence, links can point to anything from supplementary data on your website to anything related from another blog or domain.

Not all of them are that simple, of course, at least for half the entries in this WordPress blog links list. There exist other purposes for links that go beyond mere referencing, especially in SEO. In any case, let this guide act as your mini-glossary.

Hyperlinks

Sometimes, you’ll hear links being interchangeably used with “hyperlinks.” That’s because it’s simply the more technical definition of a link; some people just prefer the shorter designation. As such, you shouldn’t confuse a hyperlink as another form of link, it’s only here for formality’s sake. However, link can have a different context outside of hyperlink, so keep that in mind during discussions.

As for how and when to use hyperlinks, you merely copy and paste the URL of a website to the anchor text, or the word you want to have the link. From here on, you can also interchangeably use “hyperlink” with “link.”

Backlinks/Incoming links

Yet another designation for links or hyperlinks are backlinks. They can mean the same but bear in mind that backlinks are supposed to be links from other websites that point to your website. As such, backlinks cannot be a reference to say, an older content you made on the same website as there’s really no link between different websites there.

WordPress Blog Links

When it comes to search engine optimization (SEO), backlinks are indispensable at the moment. They can even determine how your website is going to appear on the ranking depending on who linked to you. While we don’t know for sure just how much backlinks can weigh in as a factor for SEO, we assure you that it should be mandatory enough for today though it should also be done naturally.

Another name for backlinks are incoming links. These hyperlinks, like backlinks, are nowhere to be found on your website– they appear on other people’s websites. Both can be interchangeably used but for the context of SEO, backlinks are the more popular term.

Internal links

If a link or hyperlink appears on an anchor text but only leads to another content on the same website instead of another website, then it’s only an internal link, not a backlink. As implied by the name, internal links contain the URL of parts of your website.

They’re there so that your readers, viewers, or audience can circulate better in your blog or discover older content. It’s not as required as backlinks, but should be done nonetheless if you want your readers to possibly stay longer as most of them are less inclined to visit the home page or the category section of your site to look for other content. Internal links make that easy for them.

External/Outgoing links

While you can easily confuse external links with backlinks, the distinction is that external links are made by you, while backlinks are made by other websites (and points to your website). Also, it’s a direct opposite of both internal links and backlinks/outgoing links.

Hence, external links are other websites’ URLs that you sprinkle into your content. They lead to other sites and are now considered as backlinks for the website owners whose domains you linked to. Think of it as your way of giving back to the community who also gave you some backlinks. Moreover, you can use external links to cite information or quotes.

RELATED: 4 Tips for Earning the Best Quality Backlinks

Organic/Natural links

Since you’re already aware that backlinks can boost SEO, you’ve probably already guessed that artificial backlinking happens. It’s when other companies/website owners pay other websites for that site to make a backlink for them. Apparently, Google or other search engines don’t recommend such methods and prefer organic links.

These are backlinks that others have made for your website without being asked to or paid. That can happen depending on how good or reliable your content is, or sometimes how attention-grabbing it can be. Regardless, an organic link is a good indication that your content is worth sharing, take them as compliments and give them back too.

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Self-created links

Not all of these WordPress blog links are welcome in the eyes of search engines. In fact, one of them, called self-created links are usually something you’ll want to avoid unless you want to get penalized by Google these days.

WordPress Blog Links

Self-created links usually come in the form of unmoderated blog comments (with hyperlinks attached to them), user profile pages, forum signatures, and many other things that don’t usually go through the editorial process of publishing blog contents.

Nofollow links

Linking to a notorious website (such as a porn site or a fake news site) puts your website authority at risk. However, there might be instances when you really need to based on your content; if so, this is where nofollow links come into play.

These are links with the rel=”nofollow” HTML tag. What this does is tell search engine bots and crawlers to ignore that link; thus the link will not affect your SEO. You can do this is you want to insulate your blog from the SEO damage some shady websites you link to can do. Other times, nofollow links are also automatically applied to blog comments, forum posts, and even social media posts.

Broken links

Over time, your blog might accumulate certain links that lead nowhere or to a 404 error page. That’s because they most likely have disappeared or were taken down. These are called broken links and can be inevitable for certain content or websites and there’s nothing you can do but clean them up.

WordPress Blog Links

You also can’t just ignore them; broken links can worsen your website authority and affect your SEO. They also make your older content less valid. Thankfully, you can easily find and fix broken or dead links with a WordPress plugin.

Whichever among these WordPress blog links you use, just remember to use them correctly and responsibly.

RELATED: How to Leverage Expert Roundups to Earn High-Quality Links For Your Blog

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