As an experienced blog writer, I get frustrated when businesses add a new article to their website but ignore basic SEO tips. While creating a new page of content is great, there are a few simple ways to maximise reader experience and search engine ranking.
In this article, I cover the importance of inserting hyperlinks into every blog. Let’s start with internal hyperlinks to other pages on your website…
Internal hyperlinks
Improves user experience
You should use internal links to guide readers to related content, keeping them engaged and helping them navigate your website with ease. For example, if someone lands on a blog from an accountant on ‘How to improve cash flow in a small business’, a link to an article on ‘Is it time to review your payment terms?’ makes their experience more helpful and enjoyable.
SEO tips: treat internal links as signposts – if your website is your home town, links are the street signs that help readers explore the neighbourhood.
Boost SEO and site authority
Search engines like Google and Bing use links to ‘crawl’ websites to survey their structure and content. Internal links help them discover and index your pages more efficiently. By strategically linking to other posts, especially those that may not be easily found through menus or recent posts, you increase their visibility to search engines.
According to HubSpot, internal links are “incredibly useful for Google, and most importantly, they’re useful for users”.
SEO tips: try linking an older post to a new, high-performing article. This method passes ‘link equity’ or ‘SEO juice’ to the older post, potentially giving its ranking a boost.
Reduces bounce rate
When a visitor lands on your website and quickly leaves after reading one article, that’s a high bounce rate. One way to help visitors stay longer is to add internal links to enticing and relevant content so readers are more likely to click through to another page. Encouraging visitors to spend more time on your site will reduce that bounce rate.
SEO tips: publish content on key themes to promote deeper engagement. This will help your site’s SEO while building a stronger relationship with your audience.
Increase page views per visit
Adding more content links makes your website stickier. The longer someone stays on your blog, the more valuable your content becomes to them. If you monetise your website, this becomes important when attracting advertisers or sponsors. Internal links encourage readers to keep exploring, which increases the number of pages viewed per session.
SEO tips: great content can really help ecommerce websites, leading to more conversions by promoting products, services or affiliate offers across multiple pages.
Establish content hierarchy
Internal linking should be used in conjunction with a strategy to create a clear content structure. You can show which posts are your cornerstone or ‘pillar’ content – those comprehensive guides you want to rank highly – and support them with internal links from related, shorter posts.
SEO tips: try organising your content in a logical hierarchy that both users and search engines can understand, improving overall content organisation.
To learn more, read our article ‘Clustering your blog content: why it’s essential for SEO and establishing expertise’.
Facilitates content updates and repurposing
When you update or repurpose content, internal links give you easy ways to connect it to newer or more detailed posts. This keeps your blog dynamic and helps older content stay relevant by tying it into your current content strategy.
SEO tips: track your website content on a spreadsheet so you can quickly link relevant articles and spot subjects for new blogs.
External hyperlinks
While internal links keep readers exploring your online content, external hyperlinks direct readers to other websites. While many people overlook external links, fearing they’ll drive traffic away from their site, they play an equally important role in creating a trustworthy, credible and SEO-friendly website. In short, when used wisely, external links can enhance your content and help it perform better. Let’s explore how…
Build credibility and trust
When creating a linking strategy, the aim is to link to authoritative external sources like reputable news sites, academic journals or industry leaders. This shows your content is well-researched and backed by reliable information, so readers and search engines will see that you’re citing trustworthy evidence.
SEO tips: back up facts by linking to sites containing data or research studies. Avoid using generic AI content that lacks sources.
To learn more, you may wish to read ‘The dangers of using ChatGPT to write blogs’.
Enhance SEO and page authority
Believe it or not, search engines like it when you link to authoritative sources – Google calls it being in a “good neighbourhood”. Linking to external sources helps search engines understand your content’s subject and improves semantic relevance.
SEO tips: linking to high-quality pages can contribute to Google’s understanding of your website’s place in the online universe – potentially boosting your rankings.
Adds value for the reader
Sometimes, you can’t cover everything in one post. External hyperlinks allow you to send readers to more in-depth resources, tutorials or data they may need. This improves the user experience and encourages return visits because your blog becomes known as a great resource hub.
SEO tips: when adding an external hyperlink, make sure the link opens in a ‘new tab’, so your site remains open too.
Opens the door to backlinks
When you link to other content creators, websites or influencers, you increase the chance that they’ll notice – and possibly link back to your content. This is how networking happens in the blogging world. Strategic external linking can spark relationships, collaborations and backlink opportunities that drive new traffic to your site.
SEO tips: remember to tag or email the sites you reference as they might share your post.
Supports ethical blogging and transparency
Linking to original sources gives proper credit where it’s due. This is not just ethical, it also protects you from plagiarism claims and keeps your reputation clean. Referencing someone’s research, quotes or data is the respectful and professional thing to do.
External links aren’t exits, consider them as bridges. When you connect your content to the wider world in thoughtful, relevant ways, you build trust, improve SEO and create a richer experience for your readers.
Need advice on internal or external linking?
Rather than trying to cram everything into one article, internal and external hyperlinks allow you to stay concise while still offering readers the option to dive deeper elsewhere. This improves readability and keeps your blog posts focused and engaging.
When used correctly, hyperlinks are part of a healthy, balanced content strategy. Linking is one of the most underrated but effective SEO tools, what’s more it’s free, simple to implement and can dramatically improve your blog’s performance.
Next time you publish a post, take a moment to ask: which other articles could this link to?
If you would like some help, feel free to email me at barry@wordsmart.biz