In a post titled “Sleazy Linkers Lose An Ally” Jeremy Wagstaff describes there being a “groundswell building against internal links” fingering Valleywag, Techcrunch, Mashable and other tech blogs of linking on the words of companies, sites and service leading to internal site pages. He ends his acrimonious post with:

What to do? Maybe a name-and-shame list until these recalcitrants start respecting the intelligence of their readers?

Blog Mccarthyism? Please. Before sharing some actual reader benefits of a site internal linking let me remind you of the most popular worst site on the internet for internal linking: Wikipedia. None of the blog posts I read cited Wikipedia as an example of internal links run amok. Ever been to an article there and wanted to visit the source and found yourself in a maze of internal links trying to find .. the … external … link? And yet look how Google and other search engines continue to idolize Wikipedia. It’s no wonder that some other sites are taking this practice to extremes.

And now for my own disclaimer. I’m guilty of being in this dark, “sleazy” club for internal linking on site names. Did this terrible deed here in two separate posts recently with AmazonMP3 and Zecco instead of linking to AmazonMP3.com and Zecco.com respectively. Before striking up torches, you should know that I’m not trying to do this as any kind of disservice to readers. Quite the opposite actually. Remember, writers are readers too.

Let’s consider the facts first. I removed banner ads from this site in September which took away 10-15% from the bottom line of this site. There are currently no ads running on this site that we get paid for by page views (CPM). They’re all cost per click (CPC) or cost per action (CPA).

Absolutely yes, I’d like readers to stop by and read more than one page before leaving. I’m hoping they’ll become subscribers and want to stick around and figure out this whole web thing together. And you know what, if they come to trust and like me over time, maybe we’ll do business someday. What comes around goes around. And if I write about something and mark it as an affiliate link and readers want to sign up and cut me in on a few $$ they wouldn’t see anyway, what’s wrong with that?

All site visitors that aren’t trying to do something malicious at the site are valuable to me, but I’ll freely admit those who are just passing through to click on the first link they see and leave are not as valuable as people who leave comments, get involved, subscribe and/or write about posts made here from their blogs. The fact that I’ve taken a few minutes in the wee hours of a Saturday morning to address Jeremy’s post in detail should be evidence that I care. If I mention AmazonMP3 in passing in a post on Apple iTunes, which is more helpful to readers: linking to the past post with an easy to find link or linking directly to AmazonMP3.com? Hopefully those who care about what I have to say and do, will understand the link I chose was there for a good reason, not intended to manipulate them or the search engines.

Searching for the best linking convention
Admittedly, I’m still working through linking conventions — and I’m working on completing year five of this blog and over 10 years as a webmaster — but I want to make it easier to identify links by linking the domain name rather than the name. To me if it’s the domain in the link text it should always be linked to the domain. I’m not convinced that using the name by itself, however, should always be treated the same way. Again, I point to Wikipedia. Do a little digging around subjects there and then compare. They not only have names linked internally but even the logos of companies linked internally on pages about the companies: like Microsoft. There does come a point when linking too much is bad and I think in cases like this, the Wikipedia goes overboard.

And you bet I added rel=nofollow to that link, touche for Wikipedia that adds rel=NOFOLLOW to all links on their site. The don’t think it’s important enough to help the search engines see the sources they use to build articles. Roach motel.

It’s not all transitory
New readers should be able to understand a bit of the history written on the site about each of the sites, products and services mentioned. Otherwise, why am I writing about these things at all? Just to be a point for people to stop by for a few seconds and leave to the other sites? Is it all just transitory?

Not always.

Isn’t it possible, Jeremy and others who despise this practice, that it’s actually helpful backstory to link to a prior review with screenshots or detailed text entry that fully describes a company and what it does — and in that post prominently link — to the subject website? Like how would you know how I feel about Zecco? Am I affiliated with the company somehow? Have I signed up for the service? How long have I been using it? What is my stake in writing about them, if any? You can only put so much backstory in each new post. I think it’s insulting your regular readers intelligence and irritating to keep repeating the same information instead of linking to it when relevant. No, not internal linking every time you mention a company’s name like Wikipedia, not even in every other post about a company, but when you’d like to give readers a chance to read more of the backstory and the history is relevant.

Here’s a sobering reality: an increasing number of sites I’ve written about and linked to aren’t on the web any more. This creates an operational issue for me: do I go back and remove the linkrot when something has dramatically changed? Leave it alone?

As a reader, I find it disappointing when a search engine leads me to a blog post or article about a site that is so short that I have to visit the external site to understand the context of the piece the search engine linked — only the link is now dead, so I’m off to the Wayback Machine or Google cache to try and figure out what it’s all about. Who really provided me any service? The blog/article site could have by providing more detail and history. That’s where the Wikipedia has thrived because they’ve created a more permanent experience.

Why longevity will be the new black on the internet
Longevity will be the new black on the internet, mark my words.

Blogs are riddled with dead links (including, regrettably a growing number here). So by linking to a main review or central page, bloggers are actually providing some sort of context to new visitors from search engines and they are also helping themselves to keep their archives updated and organized. I write detailed reviews for a couple reasons, one of which is I expect the review to have some sort of longevity. It’s also easier for me to return to one page and update that with the changes than updating dozens. That is a helpful service for readers.

With all that said, I’ll concede being frustrated with sites that excessively internally link for non altruistic means. Just wanted to point out that it is not that black and white though which Jeremy’s post doesn’t take into account. If it was, Google wouldn’t have assigned so much importance to Wikipedia, the most incestuous site on the internet for internal linking.

Did this post make you go hmm?

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