SEO for authors part four: the importance of links
Believe it or not, the links on your website play a really important role in improving its SEO. In this post I’m going to run through the different types of links, with some best practice tips to help you make the most of them on your website.
You want to make sure you are both linking externally (to other people's websites) and internally (to other pages within your own website).
Linking externally
Linking externally is again helpful to your readers - for example, if you write 18th century historical fiction, and one of your books features an old country estate that people can visit, make sure you link to the website for the estate, so that readers can easily click to find out how they might visit.
Another very obvious place you must link externally is to retailers, to ensure that people can buy your book easily. You should also link to your own social media platforms.
Basically anywhere you mention another website, and it would be useful for whoever is reading your website to be able to click directly to visit it, include a link.
Top tip: when linking externally, make sure you set it so that the link opens in a new window of people's browsers. This stops visitors being lost from your website (which we don't want - we want them to stay on there for as long as possible, as this is - yep you've guessed it - another thing that affects your SEO).
Linking internally
So it's pretty obvious why you would want people to be able to click through from your website to other websites, but you should also ensure that you link internally - within the pages of your own website.
Each page on your website should lead people to another page. We want to keep people moving through the pages, and ensuring that they visit all of them. So always end a page on your site with a button or link to another page - to make sure they stay on your site for as long as possible.
A hugely amateur mistake I see often with DIY websites is that each page of the website ends in a 'dead end', with no clear place for the visitor to go next. And guess what they do in that situation? That's right! They click X and leave your site.
So make sure you don't let them! You want your site to be 'sticky' and keep people on it for as long as possible.
However, unlike with external links, when it comes to internal links, we want to make sure that the links open in the same browser window. Otherwise people will end up with loads of tabs open, all with your website on, which is just annoying and messy.
Inbound links
Last but by no means least, one of the most important things for your SEO is that lots of other websites link to yours.
These links are called 'inbound links' and show Google that your website is one that others trust and like. As a general rule, the more inbound links your website has, the better.
Inbound links are especially valuable if they come from high-value websites such as the BBC, or national newspapers.
To ensure you have as many inbound links as possible, make sure you ask people to add a link to your website whenever they write about you or your books online.
I often see authors remembering to plug their social media platforms in interviews etc, but it's actually far more important that you plug your website, as this way you are constantly building links to your site, and increasing its value in Google's eyes.
You should also ask your publisher and your agent to link to your website, as their own websites will often also be high-traffic and thus highly respected by Google.