Wondering about what is Cross Linking?

The term cross linking even though how intimidating it sounds, is an extremely simple concept. It helps in enhancing the content of a website.
Read on to fully understand what it is about.

Cross Linking is defined as the process of linking one webpage to another, meaning the content on your webpage that links to another page on your website. You can also term it as anchor texts. It is an art of  creating the links within a website. For example, if you have a webpage talking about on page factors, you will definitely mention about meta description, title tags etc. You having another webpage talking particularly about meta descriptions, you might link meta descriptions with on page factors. This is known as linking one webpage to another.
 

How does cross linking works?

A very common approach for cross linking is by doing footer/sidebar links and content deep linking. For search engines, it gets really easy to rank, when you have links to your webpage containing relevant keywords from other domain names.
The motive behind this is to cross link the sites with relevant keywords and content. It will help you to to improve and achieve higher rank for the keywords and benefitting your domain.

Cross Linking create links from, for example:

• Page A to Page B
• Page B to Page A
• Page A to the home page
• Page B to the home page

   
How can cross linking help your website visitors?

By taking the above example of linking On-page factors webpage to meta description webpage, someone reading about On-page factors would want to know more about what meta description or title tags are, because the word is linked, they know that by clicking the word, they will get more information on metadescription. By continuously following the cross linking process throughout your website, you will be in a way, building relationship with your readers for educating them and providing them with proper knowledge.
 

Important elements in Cross linking!

Some of the important elements to consider are :

• Link Affiliation : If your motive was only to cross link your website and that is why you have created websites, do not forget that search engines are smart. They will get to know that and will penalize you for the same. If your site is cross linked with no outside links, then you might be punished by Google.
   
• IP address : Try to host the two sites through different IP addresses because if the search engines do pick up on the fact that the sites have common IP address, they would probably not penalize you for cross linking. Also, it will help you to improve the quality of your cross linking in search engines.
   
• No Spamming : Do not spam, even if it is your own website. Do not link every page and try to keep the links to a minimum.
   

Does Cross linking works as an SEO strategy?

Cross linking is an interesting technique to do effective search engine optimisation. Through link popularity you can determine the importance, value and relevance of the site for a particular topic.
For Search engine optimisation, both inbound and outbound links play a major role. When you build links in the content, you are increasing the traffic and building authority for your website, which also helps in creating backlinks. This way cross linking works as an SEO strategy.

Is Cross linking bad?

Well, not really. It gives you a helping hand to increase your SEO rankings. To actually benefit yourself with cross links you need to do it in a right way. Let us hear what Matt Cutts has to say about it.

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Correct way to do cross linking!

Cross linking might get you much traffic through inbound links from a specific site. But if you are a owner of many domains, then here is the right way to do cross linking:

• Unique Content : For both the domains, the content should be unique and original, so that for them, it looks like these are two different domains. If they get an idea that both the domains are from same origin, they won’t explore it.   
   
• User Feedback : Write the content for the users and not for search engines. Your main aim should be to enhance the user experience. Link your original content domains for the users. Provide them with as much information as you can. Focus on the users and you are half done.
   
• Anchor texts : Link the domains with keyword rich anchor text. Anchor text guides the user, where they are and what is the next step to follow. For search engines, anchor texts are a way to optimize the content.
   
• Similar Themes : Try to be unique with the content and not with the themes. If you change the theme, then there will be no relation with the other sites. Don’t do that. For example, one site could be of a spa website and another could be of facial website. This will help you to promote better link quality as you have linked the sites well.
   

To Sum up

Cross linking is a great technique to get a better user experience. This can be an added advantage to you, if you have sites related to it. The more inbound links you have, the better it is. Cross links also helps in improving your rank in search engines .
Make sure you don’t end up doing overlinking.