--- title: Internal Links — definition and use on service sites | Siite description: "Internal linking explained: how links between your own pages spread ranking signals, surface service pages, and rescue orphaned content." url: "https://siite.co/dictionary/internal-links" type: static generatedAt: "2026-10-22T08:21:10.787Z" --- SEO # Internal Links Links from one page of your site to another — how search engines discover pages, how importance is distributed, and how visitors move from reading to booking. Also goes by Internal linking [![Siite](/images/layout/logo.svg)Written by Siite](/about/)Updated September 8, 2026 ## Entry contents [All Terms A to Z←Browse the full dictionary](/dictionary/) Internal links are the links between pages on your own site. Unlike backlinks, you decide every one of them: what links to what, and in what words. They are how search engines find pages, how importance gets distributed, and how a reader moves from a question to the page that sells the answer. > **Briefly explained** > > - Links from one of your pages to another. > - You control every one, including the wording. > - They tell search engines which pages you consider important. > - If no page points at it, neither crawlers nor customers arrive. ## What do they actually do? They do three jobs at once, which is why they deserve deliberate attention. - **Discovery:** Crawlers follow links. A page with none is reachable only through the sitemap, which is a weaker signal. - **Importance:** Pages you link to often read as central. Pages linked once from a footer read as filler. - **Routing:** A reader who arrived with a question gets taken to the page that solves it. ## What goes wrong on most sites? Nearly every site has one of these two patterns. - **Articles disconnected from services.** Content attracts readers who then have nowhere obvious to go, so the traffic produces nothing. - **Forgotten pages.** A location or service page gets built, linked once, and left. Technically live, effectively invisible. Both are fixed with links rather than with more content. ## How do you do it well? - Link from each article to the service page that solves the problem it describes - Link related service and location pages to each other where it is honest - Use descriptive link text rather than “click here” or a bare address - Check for orphan pages after every rebuild or migration - Keep the links inside the body text, where readers actually follow them ## What is the test? Could a visitor reach every page that matters from the home page in two or three clicks, without using the menu as a crutch? If the answer is no, the menu is carrying a structure the content should be carrying. See [topic cluster](/dictionary/topic-cluster/) for the organized version of the same idea. ## What do the terms mean? - **Anchor text:** The visible words carrying the link. - **Orphan page:** A page with no internal links pointing at it. - **Crawl depth:** How many clicks a page sits from the home page. - **[XML sitemap](/dictionary/xml-sitemap/):** A list of your pages for search engines. A backstop, not a substitute for links. - **Hub page:** A page that links out to a group of related pages. Owner questions ## What owners ask us about Internal Links ### Is there a right number of internal links? +As many as genuinely help the reader. There is no magic number. There is a clear failure mode, which is a page nothing links to. ### What is an orphan page? +A page with no internal links pointing at it. Search engines may still find it through the sitemap, but it reads as unimportant and visitors never stumble onto it. ### Does anchor text matter for internal links? +Yes, and you control it completely. Descriptive wording tells both readers and crawlers what the destination is about, which is more than "click here" ever will. ### Should every page link to every other page? +No. A link that is not useful to the reader is noise, and spreading links evenly across a site tells search engines nothing about what matters. ### What breaks internal linking most often? +A redesign or a migration. Addresses change, the old links lead nowhere, and nothing looks broken because the menu still works.Put this to work ## Guides that use this Step-by-step playbooks from the team, written for owners doing the work themselves. No sign-up and no email required. [### Re-piping content cluster: rank for the highest-ticket plumbing search Whole-home re-piping is a $4-15k job with low search competition in Austin. Most operators have one thin page. Here's the cluster that captures it. Read the guide→](/articles/plumbing-repiping-content-cluster/)4.9191 reviewsWhere this turns into work ## A site that routes people to the work Articles that lead to the service pages behind them, no orphan pages, and link text that tells readers and search engines the same thing. [See the service→](/services/local-seo/)[Ask us about it](/contact/) ![Nicklas Dyrmose, SEO Specialist at Siite](/images/team/panel/nicklas-dyrmose.webp) *Our SEO specialist* ## Related entries - [### Backlink A link from another website to yours — historically the strongest off-page ranking signal, and still the main way authority is passed between sites.](/dictionary/backlink/) - [### Topic Cluster A group of related pages built around one central page — a hub covering the main topic, with supporting pages answering narrower questions and linking back.](/dictionary/topic-cluster/) - [### Technical SEO The part of SEO concerned with crawling, indexing and delivery — whether search engines can reach your pages, understand them, and render them quickly.](/dictionary/technical-seo/) - [### XML Sitemap A machine-readable list of the pages you want indexed, submitted to search engines so nothing important depends on being discovered by chance.](/dictionary/xml-sitemap/) [All terms A to Z Browse every term A to Z Open the dictionary→](/dictionary/)