Semalt: Anchor Text Types You Have To Know About

In the early days of search engine optimization, webmasters found that using keywords in backlinks and as anchor text would help their sites rank better in the search engines. Google cannot check the content of all websites manually, so it depends on those signals to increase or decrease the ranking of a website.

Frank Abagnale, the Semalt Customer Success Manager, has noted that just like different SEO tactics and practices, anchor text has become an essential part of business websites.

Anchor text and Penguin updates:

Penguin 2.0 is always discussed in the SEO communities and on social media, and it has become notorious because it focuses on anchor texts. Back in 2016, Google devalued the backlinks of sites which used lots of promotional keywords as anchor texts and placed their links on spam websites. Here we have discussed the seven types of anchor text you should avoid to prevent a Google flag.

1. EMDs use up to 60% of matching anchors with no penalties:

Some websites, with brand or domain name as money, have up to sixty percent of matching anchors, and the best part is that the anchors will not lead to the search engine penalties.

2. Non-EMDs use 1 to 3% of the matching anchors:

It's safe to say that the non-EMDs use only one to three percent of the matching anchors. For instance, if your targeted "money" keyword is different from the brand name or domain, the number of matching anchors may be below or equal to three percent. Most of the sites implement the diversification strategies in a better way; for this, they mix targeted keywords with phrases and synonyms. Because of that, the numbers of partially-matching anchors, long tail keywords and anchors with synonyms rises up to fifty percent on the internet. Alternatively, when the brand name and domain do not match the "money" keyword, the percentage of the inbound links as anchor text will be one to seven percent.

3. Naked URL is often used as an anchor:

It's safe to mention that the number of bare URLs with anchor text is increasing day by day. A large number (20-40%) of naked URLs have been used by webmasters and bloggers and are recognized as famous brands, such as namecheap.com (45% of URLs in anchors), smoking-cessation.com (95%) and hotels.com (more than 50%).

4. Non-descriptive anchors are scarce:

The number of non-descriptive anchors ranges from two to five percent only.

5. Anchors in other languages are the minor type:

The number of keywords in languages other than English ranges from 0.3% to 0.7% per brand or domain.

6. Brand name or the keyword hybrids:

Brand names and the keyword hybrids can be used to avoid a Google flag. Make sure the brand name you choose is unique and impressive.

7. Image links and optimized alt text:

The alt text in your image links is one of the major ranking factors. You should frequently use it to ensure your site's visibility on the internet.

Bottom line:

This data shows how to distribute the anchor text across a variety of niches. You can use any of these methods to avoid Google penalties and make your SEO strategies more stable than before.