The "link" is the important bit!
The most important part of the link to your site, is the link! The link needs to contain your key words to have real value.
Let’s look at two examples:
- We run a Local Search Directory in Australia and you can have a free listing in it, just follow this link:
- Get a free listing in an Australian Local Search Directory.
So which is better?
The second one is. And here is why. While the first one has a nice call to action, with “follow this link”, the link itself does not contain the keywords we want to optomise.
While the second one may lack the call to action, all our keywords are in the link AND the underlining of the text indicates to most web users that this is a “hyperlink”.
The only real was to get high quality and search engine credit for your links is to make sure that they contain the keywords you are optomising for.