Anchor Diversity

I know that with these new updates I'm supposed to do diverse anchors, but I also realize that if I don't get enough backlinks WITH the certain keyword as my anchor I won't be able to rank for that keyword in the top 5 results..

So my question is can I use the same keyword, ie: BlackHat with different links? Like BlackHat as anchor text and url goes to mysite.com/page1, mysite.com/page2, mysite.com/coolarticle etc.

Do the above, along with random, and diverse anchors, but can I apply the above technique without being punished? If there is also another way to rank for that keyword, please share if you will.

Yeah, you can use the same keyword for other pages, but if there's any real competition than you're going to need more links (with different anchors). I don't think I have to tell you that the more links you have, the more diverse your anchors need to look

I've been pretty much using my main keywords in 50% of the anchors, and the rest as other keywords, raw URL's, and generic. Seems to be working out.

Penguin (in part) seems to be going after duplicated/unnatural anchors. People automatically assume that means that they are looking for a certain percentage of 'click here', 'domain name', etc. THIS DOES NOT SEEM TO BE THE CASE.

Instead of wasting anchor text - vary your KW in longer tail anchors:

"Black Hat"
"Buy Black Hat"
"Black Hat World"
"Black Hat Forum"
"This Black Hat Forum"

And vary it in partial terms:

"Dark Hat"
"Black SEO"
"Black Forum"

And vary it in longer AT:

"Here is the Black Hat forum that I mentioned earlier"
"Black Hat has a bad reputation, but check this out"

The VARIATION is what matters, not having terms like 'click here' - which wastes AT.

If you find this useful please add 'rep' as I really struggle with those who have rep and no real sense/experience lording it over those who don't! (But of course there are some really excellent guys with lots of rep - just not all)

Thank you guys for the response, I did +rep

Now it's a lot clearer what I have to do with my links! Back to link building =]

Well anchor diversity is somewhat misleading.Using "click here" types anchors is wasting link juice.
When using Web2.0/High PR Bookmarks/High PR articles/Guestpost use direct anchors or related anchors.
Use PAD/Comments links to diversify your anchors(Naked links etc).
The rules of SEO is same its just it should look more natural now.Building links with related anchors means your site would take more time to rank for the KW but it would look more natural and prevent any sort of penalty.

ritesh said:

Well anchor diversity is somewhat misleading.Using "click here" types anchors is wasting link juice.
When using Web2.0/High PR Bookmarks/High PR articles/Guestpost use direct anchors or related anchors.
Use PAD/Comments links to diversify your anchors(Naked links etc).
The rules of SEO is same its just it should look more natural now.Building links with related anchors means your site would take more time to rank for the KW but it would look more natural and prevent any sort of penalty.

Click to expand...

You're contradicting yourself:

"Using "click here" types anchors is wasting link juice"
"The rules of SEO is same its just it should look more natural now".

non-keyword specific anchor text are essential for a natural anchor text diversity, and they're definetely not a waste of link juice / effort.

Okay, there is technically nothing to worry about the updates. Thank for the info guys.

aldis said:

You're contradicting yourself:

"Using "click here" types anchors is wasting link juice"
"The rules of SEO is same its just it should look more natural now".

non-keyword specific anchor text are essential for a natural anchor text diversity, and they're definetely not a waste of link juice / effort.

Click to expand...

For example, take a look at the links to BHW - of about 20,000 there is 1, only 1 with the AT 'click here' - lots of variation, yes, but the assumption that things like 'click here' is more natural? Not true.

As an aside, I would drop in the website name & url a few extra times, but VARIATION is the key, not avoiding targeted AT - just avoiding THE SAME AT.

As another point here - you wouldn't just be targeting 1 KW - you'd have a few like, "Trainers", "Running shoes", "Sports Footwear" - which when you do what I previously suggested you'll have a massively diverse (and all valuable) anchor text.

Having some authority on the topic (as the author of http://www.micrositemasters.com/blog/penguin-analysis-seo-isnt-dead-but-you-need-to-act-smarter-and-5-easy-ways-to-do-so/) here are my thoughts on how you should be doing anchor text:

Your links should appear in places where links would normally appear, and with anchor text that would normally be used. So for something like "Check out this awesome new product", I might make "new product" the anchor. Then in a later article it might be "I'm the owner of WordAi, a product you should all be using", and then "WordAi" becomes my anchor text. Or my above link where I made "this post" my anchor text. Why? Because that is what I was going to write anyways.

It shouldn't be just getting in your "required" generic anchors because then eventually Google will just search for people whose anchor text are similar to whatever ratios and percentages and specific generic anchors blackhats have begun to use.

SEO must always appear to be white hat, so whether you are a blackhat or a whitehat you should be taking a look at what whitehats do. Whitehats link where it makes sense to link with anchor text that makes sense in that sentence. And they don't try to "force" an anchor that doesn't make sense, and they don't always pick the same couple of words when they are deciding what anchor to use. Whitehats should continue doing that, and blackhats should automate that.

So the answer for something like this is, don't use lists of generic anchor text, or force your keyword into it, or anything like that, because that still leaves footprints. Just take an article, and find an existing phrase (sometimes without money keywords in it, and sometimes with money keywords into it) and make that your anchor text for that article.

All that stuff is really good advice for avoiding human eyes. Vitally important for long term success!

However, an algorithm cannot pick up the correct context in which a specific AT should be used - only patterns (footprints). If you are targeting keywords as in the first example, including the 'trainers' example you are not going to create any kind of real footprint.

When you are using spam bots for placing links, sure, with 1000's of links you'll get patterns, but not if we're talking about 20-200 good links - anyone who can't rank any site to make quite serious money with 200 good links doesn't know what a good link is. If they need 1000's of low value links, then they will have more problems than AT and there won't be much longevity anyway.

As long as the piece has the link AT in good, natural context (as you described) then fine. The problem comes by trying to cram something in unnaturally - if you're having things written - get them written so you don't have to either 'shoehorn' something unnatural in nor input useless AT. Useless AT is only required (in your examples) to fit with what has already been written (as if you have no control), not to get around Penguin.

But definitely food for thought. Rep given - for what it's worth from me! - I'll be digging out more of your stuff.

Everything in moderation is the key... I haven't been penalized yet, bc I continue to build quality links slow yet steady.

I Think this article will help you

Adding "click here" and similar anchor text may look natural, if it's used on forums and similar platforms. If you include "click here" in a guest blog post, that doesn't look natural, unless if it's written in the last sentence (I haven't read many blog posts that would link with "click here" in the middle of the article). The problem is also in the fact that some people may think that it's enough to just add "click here", "read more" and similar phrases in their link building plan and they will be on first page of Google, cashing big checks and live happily ever after. If your link building isn't consistent with slow growth in the number of daily/weekly links (more and more links with time), then all your work may be wasted. At the end we all come to conclusion that it's best to focus on our content and hope that readers will link to us because we have great content.