SEO: Search Engine Optimization Bible

FIGURE 6-4

Anchor text is the linked text on a web page and plays a large part in determining your search engine ranking.

We’ll come back to how other people link to you. For now, let’s consider how you use anchor text in

your web site. As we’ve already established, anchor text is the linked text on your web site. This text

can be linked either to other pages within your own web site, or it can be linked to others’ web sites

that are relevant to the content of your site. And that’s the real key to how anchor text can be so

powerful — the relevance of the link and the words used to create the link.

When a search engine crawls your site, it’s looking at several different factors — the topic of the site

as indicated by the words used in the text, the links leading away from the site, and the links leading

into the site. Of course, these aren’t the only factors that matter, but they’re among the top-ranking

factors, because how these elements are handled determines how user-friendly (and authentic) your

site is. So if your site caters to gourmet cooks, the information on your site might include articles

about gourmet techniques, gourmet recipes, and links to web sites where site visitors can purchase

gourmet ingredients or tools.

When the crawler examines your site, it’s going to see that the topic of the site is gourmet cooking

(which will be determined by the keywords you use in the site text). Then it’s going to follow all

Anchor text

103

Maximizing Pay-per-Click Strategies 6

75002c06.qxd:Layout 1 11/7/07 9:37 AM Page 103