How to Solve Poor Internal Linking Practices in Just 5 Steps

Internal links satisfy users, make your site more relevant to search, help search engines discover more of your content, distribute PageRank and strengthen ranking pages. 

For all these reasons, fixing poor internal linking practices can boost your SEO program. 

In this article, I’ll share five steps to transform your internal linking strategy and set your site up for SEO success.

1. Audit Internal Links
2. Define Your Website’s Hierarchy Through Siloing
3. Use Contextual Links Strategically
4. Get Your 404s in Check
5. Have XML and HTML Sitemaps

Final Thoughts

FAQ: How do contextual internal links contribute to a better user experience and improve SEO performance?

1. Audit Internal Links

You’ll want to get a sense of what’s working and what’s not on your website when it comes to your internal links. So, sit down, get a spreadsheet and take a good look at your site. 

First, run some tools. You can use tools like SEOToolSet®, Screaming Frog or Ahrefs. 

SEOToolSet, developed here at Bruce Clay Inc., offers a Visual Link Graph. 

This tool is powered by the site spider, which crawls your website and tracks how pages are connected through internal links. 

It’s literally a visual representation of your site’s internal linking and siloing, which can help identify the relationships between pages and detect any structural issues.

The Link Graph is especially useful for:

• Understanding how link equity (authority) flows within your site.
• Identifying orphan pages (pages with no internal links pointing to them).
• Assessing the effectiveness of SEO silos (thematic groupings of content).
• Spotting overlinked or underlinked pages.
• Improving crawlability and user navigation.

Screaming Frog crawls websites and gives a thorough breakdown of internal links, identifies orphaned pages and analyzes anchor text usage.

Ahrefs’ Site Audit tool identifies broken links and provides insights into link distribution. Additionally, Ahrefs offers a Link Opportunities feature that suggests potential internal linking opportunities based on keyword mentions across your site.

Then, document your findings. Set up a spreadsheet and track the following:

• Page URLs with issues (orphaned links, broken links, anchor text issues, etc.).
• Recommended next steps (for example, “link blog post X to page Y” or “replace broken link to resource Z”).
• Priority level (high, medium, low) based on traffic and SEO importance.

Once your audit is done, you’ll have a better picture of what needs fixing, so you can prioritize improvements that make the biggest impact. 

Related: How do I identify the most impactful internal linking opportunities?

2. Define Your Website’s Hierarchy Through Siloing

To strengthen your internal linking strategy, you’ll need to establish a clear and logical website architecture. 

We refer to this as SEO siloing, and it involves organizing your content into categories that reflect your website’s main topics and their related subtopics. 

Siloing is about grouping related content into “silos.” Each silo focuses on a main topic and is supported by more specific, related pages. 

This organization creates a natural flow for internal linking and helps both users and search engines easily navigate your site’s content.

It also helps your site build topical authority and relevance — both important to compete in the search results. 

Here are some steps to get started: 

1. Conduct keyword research. Before defining your site’s hierarchy, perform thorough keyword research to understand what your audience is searching for. This ensures your silos match user intent and search behavior. This, in turn, will enhance relevance and authority in the eyes of search engines. For more, see How To Do Keyword Research for SEO. 
2. Maintain thematic consistency. Ensure each silo focuses on a distinct theme without overlapping with others. This clarity helps search engines determine your site’s subject matter expertise.
3. Implement physical and virtual siloing. We suggest two types of siloing:

Physical siloing: Organizing your website’s directory structure to reflect your content hierarchy. For example, use URLs like www.example.com/power-tools/ cordless-drills to indicate that “cordless drills” is a subcategory under “power tools.”

• Virtual siloing: Using internal linking to connect related content. This reinforces thematic relationships even if the physical directory structure doesn’t support it.

For more, see SEO Siloing: What, Why, How.

3. Use Contextual Links Strategically

Contextual links — those embedded within your content — can significantly improve user experience. They provide readers with additional information about the topic you are talking about.

A contextual link is one like the following in this sentence, which talks about the basics of internal links. That link is a link someone can click to learn more information.   

Here are a couple of points to remember about contextual links:

• Use descriptive, keyword-rich anchor text. Instead of generic phrases like “click here,” use anchor text that clearly describes the linked content. For example, “learn more about our fractional CEO services.” Incorporate keywords naturally, making sure they fit seamlessly within the sentence to maintain readability.

• Use absolute — not relative — URLs. An absolute URL is a URL that includes the full URL address, including protocol (HTTPS), subdomain (if any), domain, path and file name. While relative URLs may be the “easier” choice in some instances, absolute URLs are easier to maintain in the long run. For more, see Absolute vs. Relative URL Linking: What’s the Big Deal, Anyway?

Strategic use of contextual links will make it easier for users and search engines to connect the dots across your content.

Related: How do I ensure my contextual links are helping users and search engines equally?

4. Get Your 404s in Check

A 404 error occurs when a server can’t find the page requested by a user or search engine.

While Google states that 404 errors don’t directly hurt your rankings, their indirect effects — such as wasted crawl budget and frustrated users — can harm your site’s overall performance.

Some of the things you’ll want to do include:

• Addressing 404s proactively. Conduct regular audits using tools like Google Search Console or SEOToolSet to identify 404 errors. 
• Implementing 301 redirects: Redirect outdated pages to new, relevant pages to preserve link equity and guide users to the correct content. See How to Remove a Webpage. 
• Create a custom 404 page. A custom 404 page improves user experience by offering options instead of a dead end. 

Addressing 404 errors will keep your site running smoothly while preserving valuable link equity.

5. Have XML and HTML Sitemaps

Sitemaps help search engines and website visitors navigate your website. 

An HTML sitemap is a central location for all important links on your website. These are usually organized by categories or topics, and provide a roadmap for visitors to find the information they need.

Ultimately, HTML sitemaps can enhance user experience and improve bounce rate. 

You can view an example HTML sitemap by checking out our sitemap.

An XML sitemap, on the other hand, is for search engines. The XML sitemap helps ensure more thorough crawling and indexing. 

The XML sitemap tells search engines which URLs are available for crawling, when each page was last updated and how important each page is on your site. 

For more, see: What Is an XML Sitemap and How Do I Make One? and How to Create a Sitemap (SEO Guide, Step 9). 

Final Thoughts

When you fix poor internal linking practices, you can improve your site’s structure, boost its SEO performance and provide a better experience for users and search engines alike. 

Start with an audit, refine your strategy and help your website reach its full potential.

Our SEO experts can work with you to improve your internal linking and SEO silo structure:

Get your free 1:1!

Quick Solutions

• How do I identify the most impactful internal linking opportunities?
• How do I ensure my contextual links are helping users and search engines equally?

FAQ: How do contextual internal links contribute to a better user experience and improve SEO performance?

Links embedded directly into the content of a website serve an important purpose: they make the website easier to navigate. 

Users of a website who see links embedded in the text find those links very accessible. 

This can serve to reduce bounce rates, and there is some evidence that this serves to increase dwell rates — an underappreciated metric that can signal to search engines that a website has high-quality content.

From an SEO standpoint, contextual internal links serve as a roadmap for search engine crawlers. 

They tell the bots which pages are the most important and which ones they should not miss, even if those pages are deeper in the site structure. 

A side benefit is that those links often are keyword-rich anchors that bots associate with content relevance.

These links also help to reinforce subject clusters. When businesses are attempting to showcase their authority, they should interconnect content around principal subjects in a natural manner. 

Even so, linking has some challenges. Poorly executed linking can confuse both users and algorithms. 

Action Plan

1. Perform a link structure audit to see how internal links are used across the site.
2. Use tools like Screaming Frog to find orphaned or underperforming pages.
3. Identify the main pages of the site and the cluster pages that support them.
4. Write the thematic segments of content that are centered on user keywords.
5. Carry out competitive investigations to identify adequate linking tactics.
6. Create a content map that expresses a logical sequencing of ideas.
7. Use concise, descriptive and relevant text for links.
8. Address specific user concerns when creating context links, such as those to FAQs or headings.
9. Via tactical positioning, funnel direct link authority to the pages that are your standout achievers.
10. Improve link placement by using navigation heat maps.
11. At the paragraph level, ensure the links are relevant.
12. Do not unnaturally stuff internal links in very keyword-heavy posts.
13. Check every three months to make sure that the links are still working well and to see if there are any links that have gone dead.
14. Develop user personas to specify likely curiosity paths.
15. After the design stage, examine the interconnected systems to see if they can enhance user interaction.
16. Avoid technical conflicts by preventing the duplication of parameters during crawls.

Bruce Clay is founder and president of Bruce Clay Inc., a global digital marketing firm providing search engine optimization, pay-per-click, social media marketing, SEO-friendly web architecture, and SEO tools and education. Connect with him on LinkedIn or through the BruceClay.com website.

See Bruce's author page for links to connect on social media.