Matter of Scale: Optimize Internal Links for Enterprise SEO

As one of the most underrated optimization strategies, internal links help to quickly and efficiently grow your site’s rank. How does an enterprise SEO agency wisely include it in an organic search campaign?

This blog post shares three effective techniques:

1. Clean up the “bad” links.
2. Support your low-performing pages with good ones.
3. Build those breadcrumbs.

Because large websites often have many pages, optimizing and scaling them is time-consuming and challenging. Consider working with a digital marketing firm specializing in your niche to save yourself from frustration.

However, read the article below to get some ideas of how internal linking works for enterprise SEO. Let’s go!

Want to learn more about the Digital Authority Partners approach to SEO? Watch this video!

1. Clean up the “Bad” Links

A good search engine optimization (SEO) plan always begins with housekeeping. This is especially vital for complex websites. These are prone to problematic URLs such as dead, missing, incorrect, or outdated. 

These types of links drag down your site’s performance in many ways:

• You need help ranking for the chosen keywords. Search engines cannot clearly determine the link’s relevance to the content.  
• When your audience cannot open the link, it ruins the user experience (UX).
• They can cause a decline in your rank. Google and Bing might think your website is poorly designed or unfinished. 

How do you know that there are bad links, though? An SEO firm conducts a technical audit, thoroughly examining the “inner workings” of the site’s pages. These include the health of the URLs and other factors that affect them, such as the schema and XML sitemaps.

The process—which usually takes a few days to a week, depending on the website’s size—can answer many questions:

• Are search engines crawling and indexing all crucial internal pages? 
• Is the internal link structure logical? Does it help distribute link equity (or “link juice”) throughout the site? 
• Do you have broken links (404 errors)? How many and where are they?
• Do you have redirects? Are they necessary?
• Are critical URLs embedded in JavaScript? Can search engines access them?
• Are canonical tags set up correctly?
• Is your mobile site different from the desktop version?
• Have you secured your URLs? Do they show HTTPS?

2. Support Your Low-Performing Pages with Good Ones

When you have hundreds of pages, some are likely to be gems. These copies, such as product pages or blogs, perform well in the search results. They rank for your targeted (and sometimes multiple) keywords and drive massive traffic to your site. 

Because of these attributes, they make powerful internal links for their low-performing counterparts. Typically, these are the ones that have the potential to shine with the right support. 

An enterprise SEO agency uses different tactics to link these two site types. One of the most effective is the hub-and-spoke model or topic clustering. 

Here is an overview of the process:

• The team performs a comprehensive content analysis or audit. This step often uncovers potential linking issues, such as duplicate content and related topics that they can group into a cluster. 
• Based on the data, they determine the best performers. These will serve as the hub or focal point of the cluster. Often, these are long-form pieces of content that cover a broad subject. 
• Digital marketers then identify the “spokes.” Sometimes called the subpages, they add more specific information to the hub. These are also your low-performing pieces of content. 

• The team links the hub to them to pass the link juice and traffic to these subpages, and vice versa. You may also connect subpages to strengthen their relevance to one another, further display expertise on the subject, and improve the UX.

A few pointers, though, when interlinking content:

• Link only when it makes sense.
• Make sure that the content is worth linking to the hub. Update it with fresh information. Increase its E-E-A-T by backing up claims with newer data or statistics. 
• Be explicit with hyperlinks rather than focusing on using the exact-match keyword or page (e.g., “Shop for 18k gold necklaces” instead of “click the product page”).

3. Build Those Breadcrumbs

Like in the famous story of Hansel and Gretel, breadcrumbs lead search engine spiders deeper into your website. In the process, the search engine better “understands” the site’s hierarchical structure, the content's relevance to one another, and the targeted keywords. 

Breadcrumb navigation also improves user and customer experience by providing “spatial awareness.” It quickly informs the user about the site and where they are on it.

Furthermore, familiarity decreases the learning curve because this method has become standard among large ecommerce platforms. Your audience, therefore, quickly learns how to navigate the site, even if it is their first visit. 

Breadcrumbs have at least three types, each with its pros and cons:

An enterprise SEO agency helps you choose the breadcrumbs. Most sites use the location-based path for optimization because it best represents the site’s architecture. 

Some marketers mistakenly believe that breadcrumbs or the click path should be short. Users should be able to get their desired information in three clicks or less. Otherwise, their ranking and UX suffer. 

Although ideal, it is not a hard rule. Instead, consider the following:

• The click path should be clear, straightforward, and simple. The user should immediately understand the context and navigate the site quickly.
• Every level must be relevant and clickable.
• Use the trail only when needed. For example, attributes are better displayed as filter options. 
• Optimize the trail for mobile.

Summing Up

Internal linking highlights other notable, potentially revenue-generating aspects of your website. It also strengthens relevance to your niche and targeted keywords and enhances the UX. For enterprises, it promotes better site architecture, usability, and accessibility. 

Although link building is challenging for large sites, these three techniques simplify it. Digital Authority Partners (DAP), a results-oriented enterprise SEO agency, provides more advanced strategies to supercharge your campaigns. Call us today to learn more.