• Three Click Navigation Keeps Your Visitors Happy •
• More Than That And Most Likely It’ll Be “Bye-Bye” •

Here’s a very important rule I encourage you to always keep in mind when you are setting up your site’s HTML inter-linking structure: Remember It’s Gotta Be Three Clicks From Here-to-There.

This means that no matter where a visitor has entered your site, it shouldn’t take them more than three clicks to reach the information they’re looking for. It’s a well known fact that a large percentage of your site’s visitors are NOT going to be entering via your Home page. If you’ve done a good job of providing keyword focused content, many of the visitors will be coming into your site from a search engine.

On average, visitors are only willing to give you a three click chance to find what they are looking for, and if they can’t reach their target destination within those 3 all important clicks, you’ve lost them. Tah-tah … bye-bye.

Don’t Frustrate Your Visitors!

It is very frustrating to your visitors if they have to click through too many pages to get to the content they came hoping to find. Yes, you can argue that if they came from a search engine, then they are probably landing on a page that provides the information they were looking for.

But in many cases, they’re looking for more. Think about your experiences when searching for information. I don’t know about you, but I very often will seek out more info if I land on a site that has done a pretty good job of providing me what I’m looking for.

But if it is confusing to navigate the site, or it is too many clicks to get to other information that pertains to the subject I’m interested in … I’m gone.

Remember to make all the information on your site be no more than three clicks away from any point within your site. Providing multiple HTML linking paths throughout your site is encouraged. This can be achieved via your primary navigation, or through contextual hyperlinks within the content, even from the HTML site map you should have on your site.

The “three click rule” for HTML linking is yet another, important way for your site to be well received by those very much desired visitors.

• Some Dos and Don’ts When Inter-Linking Pages On Your Site •
• Keep It Easy For Your Visitor •

As far as basic SEO steps are concerned, it is important to provide good HTML linking to help your website rank higher in the search engines. In addition, the HTML links (called ‘hyperlinks’ because when you click on the link it takes you to another page) between all your website’s pages should also be thought of as a user-friendly, ease-of-navigation issue.

What do I mean by this? Well, let me use a real life example from a website that I am currently hired to not only search engine optimize, but to also rearrange so that the site visitors can more easily navigate their way around.

I’ll share this example: the site owner emails a very nice, content rich newsletter to her list each month. She also smartly utilizes each newsletter as a new page of content for her website. So, we can all agree that this would mean that she places twelve new, keyword focused web pages on her site every year.

In the simplest form of navigation hierarchy, it would make the most sense to have a navigation button (this is an HTML linking example) that would link us to a second-tier page where she could list out each month’s newsletter with a brief overview of what the subject was. These hyperlinks would take the visitor to the actual month’s newsletter.  The newsletters would site on what would be the third-tier.

Here’s an example of the newsletter links she could have on the second-tier page:

January 2008: Aromatherapy Using Rosemary  The herb rosemary helps bring clarity of mind. Learn how to use it when defining your New Year’s intentions.

February 2008: Aromatherapy Using The Essence of Rose  Yes, this is the month of love! Learn all about the scent of Rose and why it’s used for love and romantic intentions!

Each month’s newsletter would be hyperlinked in this fashion. Each newsletter would be sitting on its own web page. Each page’s file name would be keyword optimized such as the file name for January could be:
        www.nameofsite.com/january2008-aromatherapy-rosemary.html
        www.nameofsite.com/february2008-aromatherapy-rose.html

Unfortunately, This Is Not The HTML Linking Structure Currently In Use

My client has made a big mistake by linking her newsletters in the following way:

•  She has not provided a landing page from the navigational HTML link to a second-tier page as I have mentioned;

•  Her HTML linking structure for all the newsletters consist of one link at the bottom of each newsletter, stating “click here for last month’s newsletter”;

•  And worse yet … it isn’t the current month’s newsletter that is accessed when you click on her “Newsletter” navigation button, no! It is the oldest newsletter.

Can you understand how clumsy and aggravating this is to someone who wants to access her most current newsletter to see what she’s wriring about this month? Or to someone who wants to see a nice overview of all her newsletters because they wish to reference back to one they had read months before?

You need to think out the HTML linking you’ll use on your site. Not only is it advantageous for SEO ranking purposes to have all your website pages inter-linked, but it is also most important to have a very carefully thought out, easy-to-navigate website for your visitors.

Make your HTML linking structure simple, clearly defined and easy for your visitor to figure out ‘where to go next’. This is but one more way to you can encourage your visitors to stay on your site for a longer period of time. And the longer they stay, the more option you have to make them aware of your products or services!

• Don’t Say “Click Here” … Utilize Those Precious Keywords •
• Your Visitors & The Search Engine Spiders Will Appreciate You •

There is a lot of neglect given to hyperlinks not only by newbies, but by lots of established internet marketers. I see it all the time. Most notably is the awful use of “Click Here” for the hyperlink’s content.

Why is “click here” wrong? Well, if you have the option of inserting some commentary if you will, whichs helps let your visitor know a little more about WHY they are clicking on the hyperlink, that just helps increase the interaction with your visitor.

Next, you want to insert your targeted keyword phrase into the hyperlink because you give the search engine spiders a good idea about what your page’s content is all about. Hyperlinks with keywords in them are great stuff to help with getting higher rankings.

Remember that it’s a lot of different components of SEO that ultimately adds up to the overall keyword ranking positions. Hyperlinks are just one part of the SERP’s puzzle.

Why You Need To Insert Your Keywords

When your visitors see a hyperlink that contains your targeted keywords (and maybe some additional descriptive text) more than likely they’ll feel compelled to click on it. I am assuming that your site is of an informational type, so your visitors have come to your site searching for answers, solutions, or information. So, stick it clearly under their nose! Write content rich hyperlinks to encourage them to click on them.

If a hyperlink happens to be one that leads to an affiliate product or website, can you see how important a well written, keyword rich hyperlink can be to help encourage your visitor to click … rather than the “click here” alternative?   

Short & Sweet or Very Descriptive

It’s up to you, but you can use just a few words, or your hyperlink can be quite descriptive. I know that the “norm” on most sites are rather short hyperlinks … but there is no rule to this, so get creative if you wish. Hey … if it might compell a potential customer to click on an affiliate product link (meaning you have the opportunity to make some $$ if they decide to buy), then what is wrong with getting very obvious and just a touch pushy that you want them to CLICK on your great hyperlinked text?

The typical way most folks utilize hyperlinks is something like this:
For more information, click here to learn about our New Orleans Getaway.

Getting a little more bold, yet creative, you could try something like hyperlinking an entire sentence, as example:
Sign up for my free Homemade Chocolate Candy Lovers newsletter and receive a valuable Hershey’s chocolate coupon.
Contact one of our Dental Sedation Consultants and we’ll direct you to a qualified Dentist in your area.

Can you see how using a hyperlink in a very descriptive way does have its benefits?? If you’ll notice, I’ve worked in a primary keyword phrase along with a modifier in each sentence. That’s good stuff for the spiders! In addition, you’ve really gotten across to your visitor exactly what will happen when they click the hyperlink. There’s certainly no confusion … you’ve helped push them into the action you desire