when evaluating an inbound link and determining how much "link juice" it will pass to your site, should I worry about a high total number of links (including internal links), or just the # of external links? I've always assumed only external links really matter in terms of diluting link juice.
Hello Dear, External link are really matter for building the proper link. Internal are not so useful in terms of links building.
Well, Google consider ALL links (internal and external links) on the page when estimating the value if each link. BUT if you look at the website as a whole, the amount of internal links doesn't matter. I hope you see the math.
watch out for site wide links - number can show up as +10k links - but then its really only one refering IP address... the internal links - do you mean number fo pages? or are you meaning the outbound links? again this is used to assimilate quality - i.e. i wouldnt place a link on a site with a link to viagra etc... If it has a high number of outbound links - be wary - as the link juice is diluted over these outbounds...
I wouldnt worry about internal links, rather number of external links is a factor. you can make them nofollow.