When it comes to attracting links to your law firm website, there is a lot of misinformation on the web. In this video, Google’s Head of Webspam, Matt Cutts, explains whether multiple links from one page to another page count in Google’s ranking algorithm.
As Matt states, the larger point is here is that if you’re worried about trying to hoard, sculpt, or otherwise manipulate PageRank on your site, you’re missing the bigger picture.
The effort and energy put into any incremental gains you might think you’re gaining by shaping PageRank are much better spent on content development that attracts links and shares.
If you think about PageRank as a fluid, and your website as an intricate vessel through which that PageRank fluid flows, spending time shaping your PageRank through internal link manipulation is like trying to get more of the same amount of fluid to flow to different chambers (pages) of the vessel (website). Developing new content that attracts links and shares is like pouring more fluid into the vessel.
Which makes more sense. Trying to squeeze more of that existing fluid or adding more fluid to the entire system?
That’s not to say that thinking about your site’s organization isn’t important. Obviously, burying quality informational pages deep within your site is a bad idea. It hides your best content from your users. It makes it more difficult for search engine spiders to find, crawl, and index.
One of my favorite analogies for a good site architecture I first heard from former Mozzer Danny Dover. Think of your website like an ant hill. The opening of the ant hill is your homepage. Each link is like a tunnel connecting various web page chambers. You want each of the chambers to be easily accessed from the top of the ant hill. That means you want to organize your website in a way that allows easy navigation from your home page all the way down to the deepest chamber of your site.
Once your site is effectively organized, with a plan for the addition and location of new content, stop worrying about it and focus on publishing content that motivates your visitors to read it, link to it, and share it with other people in their networks.
Words of wisdom for sure..
Very helpful. The ant hill analogy especially so — made the video much more understandable. Thanks.