We all know about the advantages of obtaining links to our websites from respected external sites. However, there’s significant benefit to be gained from adding links on our own sites. These can be within the site or to external sites, but either way, they do add context to the pages they’re on, which search engines recognise.
If we’ve got explanatory (‘authority’) pages on our websites, it’s an open goal to link to them from anywhere we can on those sites. For example, if we have a White Paper page called ‘The Ultimate Guide to Blue Widgets’, then on every blue widget product page, I’d link to this page from the first occurrence in the text of the term ‘blue widget’. This helps readers, and it helps search engines.
We can also link out to third-party sites. Assuming these aren’t commercial or competitive, there’s no harm in visitors popping off to visit them for background information. The advantage (again) is that it ties the page in to an acknowledged source, and gives the search engines some context.
Updating and creating links across our sites is a simple exercise, and a good use of anyone’s time.