I use only 2 anchor text variations for my terms , singular and plural form for the terms I after, i.e. green widget green widgets good hotel good hotels Is this the right way to do it? Thanks
I use far more than that. If I have a URL that I am trying to rank for "green widgets" (plural) only (i.e. <title> = "Green Widgets") then I will use something like the following: green widgets (exact match - 30-40%) green widget (singular - 10-20%) For the remaining 40-60% I would use as many variations as possible... giving priority first to 3 word phrases with "green widgets" (plural) being the first 2 words... then priority to 3 word phrases with "green widget" (singular) being the first 2 keywords... followed by 3 word phrases with "green widgets" (plural) being the 2nd and 3rd keywords in the phrase... followed by 3 word phrases with "green widget" (singular) being the 2nd and 3rd keywords in the phrase... then a tiny amount of 4 and 5 word phrases. green widgets gallore green widgets manufacturer green widgets sale green widget maintenance green widget sales big green widgets small green widgets big green widget small green widget and so on. However if my URL has multiple but VERY similar keyword phrases being targeted (i.e. <title> like "Green Widgets - Big Green Widgets - Fresh Green Widgets") then I would likely use something like: Green Widgets - Primary keyword phrase 35% Big Green Widgets - secondary keyword phrase 25% Fresh Green Widgets - tertiary keyword phrase -15% With the remaining 25% or so spread out over 3-5 word. So when I'm targetting multiple keywords in a <title> I tend to have fewer number of inbounds with variations, and focus instead on the the 3 phrases in the <title>. But that's just me.
Most guys here will tell you to vary your anchor text, but from my experience that confuses Google, I only ever use the main keyword or my pen name as anchor text. Also Google see's "good hotel" and "good hotels" as the same thing anyway, if you use just "good hotel" as anchor text you'll rank for "good hotels" as well, and probably a ton of other variations to. -Jay.
Not quite right... Google sees "Good Hotel", "GOOD HOTEL", "good hotel" as all the same because they ignore capitalization. Click on all three links and place the results side by side. Notice how the results are the same. But they see singular "good hotel" and plural "good hotels" as very different keywords. Click on both links and view the results side by side. Notice the difference in the results. "good hotel" will help you rank for "good hotels" and visa versa. But if you are trying to rank for the singular then links with the singular form of the noun will help more than links with the plural form of the noun. Also, having a page with more than a handful of links that has EVERY link using the same link text looks unnatural. Imagine if you had a page with 1000 inbound links and every one of them used the same link text. You don't think Google can detect that as being unnatural through even an automated process? And it would be obvious from a manual review. I'm sure Google has tools that their people use to key in a URL and display all known backlinks with link text, relevance scores, PR of the page where the link lives, etc. Having the same link text would jump out like a sore thumb... like when you do a site:example.com command on a site and EVERY <title> element on the site has the same value. Bad IMO. The chances of that happening naturally "in the wild" is zero. I strongly urge you to vary your link text. Not only does it look natural, but it will help that page rank for lots of slight variations of your targeted phrase(s) that you might not have even thought about.
Hi Canonical I just came across this post via a Google search for plural/singular anchor text variation. That post helped me out, thanks. I have a query though: I understand your second method, which I and many others use - you try to rank for 3 or 4 words. You stick em in your title tag. And you build anchor texts to match. It sets your variations to 25% - 33% which should be safe, and also maximize the chances of building good link numbers for each phrase, as 33% is possibly the safe maximum (although my fear-threshold is normally nearer 25%). So with all those advantages, what's the benefit of your first method? I'm understanding that all those anchor text words cannot be in your title tag? And therefore it would be difficult for you to rank for against competitors who had those complete words in their title tags? Could you explain? Are you maybe saying that in that situation you'd only be trying to rank for ONE phrase....and since you can't have 100% an anchor text for that phrase, you add those variations to cast a wide semantic net for unforseen or very-long-tail variations? Or to give some kind of sematic relevance effect? Please let me know as I'm really curious. Cheers.