How many links are too many on a page?
11th March 2009 by Emily Mace
Matt Cutts recently blogged about the 100 links per page recommendation that Google Makes in it’s Webmaster Guidelines and discussed what the implications were from an SEO point of view.
Google makes a recommendation that no more than 100 links should be posted on each page of a website. However, these guidelines are in the “Design and Content” section of their guidelines. Primarily this recommendation is put in place from a user point of view, as presenting your visitors with over 100 links on a page can be baffling and off-putting. Users like content, not lists of links, so where possible include your links within the context of copy and don’t just create a long list of links to other pages.
Google may choose not to follow or index the links on the page if there are more than 100 links present, which could affect the ability of pages on your site to be visible in Google’s Index, and therefore rank well for your keywords. So, although the guideline about the number of links is primarily driven towards the usability of your site, there could be search engine optimisation implications if you choose to ignore this.
If you are creating a Sitemap.html page for your website, which is good for your users and the Search Engine Optimisation of your website, then obviously you will be creating a long list of links, which is OK for Google. However, if the site contains more than 100 pages, then it is a good idea to create multiple page sitemaps to list the links. Try grouping your links in relevant categories, and similar links listed together.
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