confused with anchor text ratio. can anyone help me clarify?

Let's if my site is about best widget and i keep my onsite keyword density is below 1.5% for any word. When i build backlinks, i may use anchors like "best blue widget", "best red widget", "top widget" and so on. So nearly every anchor includes the word "widget". does this result stuffing to get a penality and affect the ranking of "best widget"?

i'm confused because when i use ahrefs to check my backlinks, my "Anchor Phrases" is below 10%, but my "Anchor Terms" is about 70% for a word. i'm not sure i should focus on the density of "Anchor Phrases" or "Anchor Terms" or both.

Any advice?

Thanks very much!

yes, if each of your anchor has the same word, that will probably cause a penalty

Why not diversify your anchor text with..

Raw/Naked URLs?
Generic sentances
Synonyms
Long sentances
Related Kws from your niche
kws with Symbols
kws with numbers

I'd recommend you push your brand as the most used anchor (from domain.com, 'domain' would be your brand name unless it's an EMD) - it makes most sense and most sites i've analyzed do it that way.

After that would be the domain/naked URLs, then some keywords, some article titles as anchors, LSI content and the generic (click here, read, here, more, source).

accelerator_dd said:

I'd recommend you push your brand as the most used anchor (from domain.com, 'domain' would be your brand name unless it's an EMD) - it makes most sense and most sites i've analyzed do it that way.

After that would be the domain/naked URLs, then some keywords, some article titles as anchors, LSI content and the generic (click here, read, here, more, source).

Click to expand...

Exactly that is how you build a brand in 2015

howard_hughes said:

yes, if each of your anchor has the same word, that will probably cause a penalty

Why not diversify your anchor text with..

Raw/Naked URLs?
Generic sentances
Synonyms
Long sentances
Related Kws from your niche
kws with Symbols
kws with numbers

Click to expand...

Thanks. I do use these to diversity, but most anchors still include a word. I'll use more naked urls and generic anchors.

accelerator_dd said:

I'd recommend you push your brand as the most used anchor (from domain.com, 'domain' would be your brand name unless it's an EMD) - it makes most sense and most sites i've analyzed do it that way.

After that would be the domain/naked URLs, then some keywords, some article titles as anchors, LSI content and the generic (click here, read, here, more, source).

Click to expand...

Thanks, but i'm not sure what exactly the brand anchor is. let's if i want to rank "best widget", and my domain is www.widgetinsight.com, so my brand is Widget Insight or WidgetInsight? If it's Widget Insight, then the word "widget" may have a very high percentage if i focus on building brand because my other anchors may contain it as well, like "best widget", "red widget" and "blue widget", etc.

Thanksyouall said:

Thanks, but i'm not sure what exactly the brand anchor is. let's if i want to rank "best widget", and my domain is www.widgetinsight.com, so my brand is Widget Insight or WidgetInsight? If it's Widget Insight, then the word "widget" may have a very high percentage if i focus on building brand because my other anchors may contain it as well, like "best widget", "red widget" and "blue widget", etc.

Click to expand...

You would be fine with Widget Insight and WidgetInsight, I've seen situations like that and sites were ranking without a problem.

When working on longtails, you can diversify and you don't have to maintain a keyword density. Even using each of your longtails once could be useful for your seo efforts.