Ok Please post some feedback of your own experience Here goes: 1) Ive seen sites rank #1 for say "blue widgets" .... with maybe 100 backlinks...... but maybe only 2 had the anchor text "Blue Widgets", and those 2 werent even 'strong' backlinks So what this tells me is..... you dont need to have 90 backlinks with the same anchor text.... maybe 2-3 is ok 2) I have a feeling Google can detect unnatural link paterns. For instance.... if you have 100 backlinks... and 90 say: Blue Widgets ......... and not: Blue widgets (lowe case w)....... widgets that are blue........ widgets .... click here for blue widgets...... www.BlueWidgets.com ...... BlueWidgets.com.... BLUE WIDGETS (all caps) etc. All of those anchor look more natural than a solid Blue Widgets ..... I think Google detects that Ok check this out.... heres my main proof..... my own proof: Right now, my homepage is targeting 2 keywords (soon 3)...... 1) I come up 1st page for one keyword..... that I only have 1 backlink with that title..... 2) I come up 2nd page for the other keyword.... where i have about 100 backlinks with that title........... some from authority .edu sites you name it So my hypothesis is... Google might discount anchor weight if its excessive What do you guys have to say about this??? - FBos
It's difficult for anyone else to come to a conclusion about this without knowing which keywords you are targetting, what your URL is etc. It is entirely possible that the keyword you are ranking on page 1 for is a lot easier to target than the other keyword which has a lot more targetted anchor text. Perhaps you could expand on the information you provide by giving an idea about the competitiveness of each keyword. But even then it is difficult to determine anything from this because there are so many other factors, like the prominence of the keyword on the page and its position in your page title. You only have one example here so it's not easy to draw conclusions from just one example. I'm sure we could find other examples where someone is excessively targetting the keyword in anchor text and is ranking well for that keyword. Having said that, I think you do raise an interesting point that it is possible to over optimise a page for a particular keyword and I'm sure that it is plausible that it can work against you in some cases if all your anchor text is exactly the same.
LOL @ "I have a feeling Google can detect unnatural link paterns" Google is really good at this and most people have the problem of using the same anchor text too much.
If Google hates LOTS of links to a website with the same anchor... then I'm pretty screwed. Even though this information may not be correct, thanks for letting me know.
Umm, yes, I would say that Google would discount/penalize excessive use of anchor text. The problem is that we don't know exactly at what point this happens. It's best to use your primary anchor text (keywords) in about 60% of the links, and use variations in the remaining 40% of the link anchor texts. So if you wanted to rank for "life insurance" and had 100 links, you should give yourself 60 links with the term "life insurance" and then have 40 links with variations such as: cheap life insurance insurance cheap insurance domain.com click here insurance rates for life insurance etc., Doing this should keep your site from attracting undue attention and receiving a penalty/filter. No links can harm you unless, you get a massive amount (thousands) in a very short period of time (24-48 hours) and from untrusted websites (domains with little, or no history/aging) and with the same anchor text. This kind of "link building" is the footprint of automated software. If you receive links gradually, with a variety of anchor text, from a wide variety of domains and IP addresses your site will be fine.
What I realised for a while is that the backlink doesn't need to come from good PR site, but the site which is google's baby (which is scanned from google every day few times - when that site publish something it's already on google). It doesn't matter if that site from which you have backlink has also backlinks.. so you can buy better post for $5, then for $20, but again, it's even better if that site from where are you buying has both - PR and is google's baby .
I have done some experimenting with this in the past and it is indeed good to mix it up a bit. What I have seen is keeping the anchor tags related but not always the same is the best. So when I start targeting "gizmos" for example, I have noticed it caused me to rise in the SERPs for "widgets". A thesaurus comes in handy for this. http://thesaurus.com/ The same holds true for onsite optimization. You want to use related terms along with your main keywords. I have also noticed that once your site is aged and has built a bit of authority it is much easier to add additional keywords and terms on your site that will move up quickly even though you have no external anchor text for these terms.
Google is actually getting scary... I really dont want to mess with them...... I might shut my curtains on my windows so they cant see what im typing from their Google Earth satelites... unless they have Google X-Ray vision which could be possible soon Here check this out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fsKOcAePH2s
Hahahaha... this is funny: "Google Earth is not funny anymore" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kswJuKfYtI&feature=related
With older sites you can do quite well in SERPs using just internal linking within a site if the terms are not too competitive.
I have a theory about anchor text in Google's algorithm.... I bet that Google detects JUNK links..... and while they may not harm you...... it does set off a trigger for the spiders to check your site even further....... So then after a deeper analysis bu the spiders, if its found you have an unnatural linking pattern.... then those links may be discounted big time or to 0 all together And if you have other authority links, then hey... you're an authority site....... If not, then losing the juice for those over optimized looking anchors WILL hurt you by you losing the few link juice you had
I have seen similar things when doing backlink research on my competitors and finding niches that may support this but it is still inconclusive.
I would say that you need about 60-80% your anchor text, it just has to be relevant to your web. That's my experience.