Let’s talk about a simple concept – the idea of links; also known as hyperlinks. A Hyperlink is simply a reference to another page on the internet; links can also point to documents, pictures, videos, or some other web object that exists on the internet.

Every element on the internet has an address and a link leads you to it:

Let’s look at an example:

Here is a page in Nelson Bermas’ Website: http://www.nelsonbermas.com/Summer-Lake-Lexington-SC-SummerLake-neighborhood-homes-for-sale

The long address that you see is called a URL or basically the address of the page on the internet.

Let’s us assume that Nelson (By the way he is a cool guy and you ought to know him!!!) is writing a blog and he wants to reference the above address – he could do the following:

My Name is Nelson Bermas and one of the neighborhoods I specialize in is called SummerLake; it is a new neighborhood located on Hwy 378, west from the town of Lexington, SC. here is a link so you can learn more about it: http://www.nelsonbermas.com/Summer-Lake-Lexington-SC-SummerLake-neighborhood-homes-for-sale

The above paragraph has nothing structurally wrong with it; and yes everyone can click on that long link and get to where it leads; but it is not elegant and worse it does not send the right signals to Search Engines to index the page properly – it is lacking an anchoring mechanism. (One comment before I move on – Nelson will never be caught doing that – he knows better!)

Let’s look a second version of the same text:

My Name is Nelson Bermas and one of the neighborhoods I specialize in is called SummerLake; it is a new neighborhood located on Hwy 378, west from the town of Lexington, SC.

You will notice a few things:

1. You will notice that the word SummerLake has been hyperlinked and it sends you to the same page as the one with long URL.

2. The text that Nelson linked, namely SummerLake, is called the Anchor Text.

3. You will also notice that he got rid of the silly sentence: “here is a link so you can learn more about it.” – you see the internet has matured enough that most consumers know a link when they see it; it is in fact insulting on your part to say Click Here!

Here is kicker – the Anchor Text, or the text that is being linked, helps Search Engines organize the Internet through their Indexing mechanism by understand what you mean… STOP SAYING CLICK HERE…

PS: I hear some of you ask – how did you link the text to the URL address; very easy:

1. Copy the address (URL) of the destination you want to send your visitors to; in this case: http://www.nelsonbermas.com/Summer-Lake-Lexington-SC-SummerLake-neighborhood-homes-for-sale

2. Highlight the text you wish to Link; in this case: SummerLake

3. Find the link Manager ( ) or Hold the Ctrl key and the click the letter K.

4. Once the link Manager pops paste the copied link into the address bar… (Pasting works by using Ctrl-V)

5. You are done!

Happy Blogging – Key Yessaad