Anchor text is the clickable text of a link. It is one of the oldest signals search engines use to understand what a linked page is about, and it is also one of the easiest to get wrong. Too generic and the link tells Google and readers nothing. Too keyword-heavy and the link starts to look engineered.
I have reviewed the anchor profiles of a lot of SaaS sites since I founded my link building agency in 2022, and the same mistakes come up again and again. This guide covers what anchor text is, how Google uses it, the main anchor types, what a natural backlink anchor profile looks like, and how to audit and fix yours. It focuses on anchors in backlinks from other sites. For the internal side (links between your own pages), see my guide to internal linking for SEO.
What is anchor text?
Anchor text is the visible, clickable words inside an HTML link. In the code below, the anchor text is “link building pricing”:
<a href="https://example.com/pricing/">link building pricing</a><aopens the link element.href="..."is the destination URL.- The text between the opening and closing tags is the anchor text.
</a>closes the link.
When an image is the link, Google uses the image’s alt attribute as the anchor text. That is why linked logos and buttons need descriptive alt text.
Anchor text shows up in three places that matter for SEO:
- Backlinks: links from other websites to yours. You influence these but don’t control them; the publisher’s editor has the final say.
- Internal links: links between pages on your own site. You control these completely.
- Outbound links: links from your site to others. These shape how readers (and search engines) judge your sources. See my post on outbound links.
How Google uses anchor text
Google’s own link best practices say good anchor text is descriptive, reasonably concise and relevant to the page it points to. The same page gives a useful test: read the anchor on its own, out of context. If it still tells you what you will get after clicking, it is good anchor text.
The documentation also flags two things to avoid:
- Empty or generic anchors such as “click here” or “read more”, which tell neither users nor Google what the target page covers.
- Forcing keywords into anchors. Google notes that keyword stuffing is a violation of its spam policies.
The words around a link matter too. A link reading “Zluri case study” inside a paragraph about SaaS organic growth carries more context than the same link in a sidebar list.
In practice, anchors help in three ways: they signal the topic of the target page, they pass part of the linking page’s value (see how link equity works), and, on your own site, they group related pages into clear topic clusters.
Where anchor text crosses into link spam
Google’s spam policies list “links with optimized anchor text in articles, guest posts, or press releases distributed on other sites” as an example of link spam, alongside paid links that pass ranking credit, excessive link exchanges and links created by automated programs.
That has a practical consequence: the anchors pointing to your site should look like what an editor would naturally write. A profile where dozens of unrelated sites all link with the same commercial phrase (“best project management software”) is a pattern that algorithms and manual reviewers are built to spot. Google’s Penguin update, folded into the core algorithm in 2016, was designed to devalue exactly this kind of manipulative link.
So when you work on backlink anchors, the goal is not to hit a keyword quota. It is to earn links whose wording is accurate, varied and editorially chosen.
The main types of anchor text
Most SEO tools sort anchors into the categories below. Examples assume a SaaS company called Acme that sells project management software.
Branded anchors
The brand or company name: “Acme”, “Acme’s blog”, “the team at Acme”. These are the most common anchors for any real business because that is how people naturally refer to you. They are also the safest, since a brand name is not a ranking phrase anyone is trying to manipulate.
Naked URL anchors
The URL itself: “acme.com” or “https://acme.com/pricing”. Common in citations, resource lists and directory profiles. Like branded anchors, they read as natural.
Partial-match and topical anchors
Text that includes or describes the topic without repeating the exact target phrase: “Acme’s guide to sprint planning”, “this project tracking template”, “a breakdown of agile tools”. These carry useful relevance signals and are what a writer usually produces when they link to a resource in the middle of a sentence.
Exact-match anchors
The precise keyword the target page wants to rank for: “project management software”. In backlinks, these are the anchors most associated with manipulation, so a natural profile has very few of them. They are fine, and often the clearest choice, in internal links where you control both pages.
Generic anchors
Phrases like “this article”, “here” or “source”. Every natural profile has some, but they give Google little context. On your own site, replace them with descriptive text.
Image anchors
When an image is linked, its alt text works as the anchor. A linked logo with alt="Acme logo" is a branded anchor; a linked image with no alt text is effectively an empty anchor.
What a natural backlink anchor profile looks like
There is no Google-published “safe ratio”, and anyone who quotes one as a rule is guessing. What I use is a working benchmark, based on the anchor profiles of the SaaS sites I audit and build links for. Healthy profiles usually look something like this:
| Anchor type | Typical share of referring links | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Branded and naked URL | 50–70% | Should be the majority for most businesses. |
| Partial-match and topical | 15–25% | Descriptive phrases chosen by the linking writer. |
| Generic | 10–20% | “Here”, “this post”, “source”. |
| Exact-match commercial keyword | 5% or less | Anything above this deserves a closer look. |
Treat these numbers as a smell test, not a target. Two points matter more than the exact percentages:
- Compare against your niche. Look at the anchor profiles of the sites ranking above you. If their exact-match share is 2% and yours is 25%, that gap is the problem, whatever a generic benchmark says.
- Don’t engineer external anchors. Building links to a spreadsheet of anchor percentages is itself a pattern. On the placements my team builds, the publisher’s editor chooses the final wording; I suggest branded or descriptive anchors that fit the sentence, and I accept the editor’s changes.
Common anchor text mistakes
Over-optimizing backlinks
The classic mistake: asking every guest post, niche edit or PR placement to use the same money keyword. It concentrates risk in exactly the pattern Google’s spam policies describe. If a site has taken a hit after a burst of keyword-anchored links, start with a backlink audit and review my guide to toxic backlinks before doing anything else.
Misleading anchors
An anchor should describe what is on the other end. Linking “2026 industry benchmark report” to a generic glossary page frustrates readers and teaches them not to trust your links. The same applies to citations: describe the source as what it is (“Google’s spam policy documentation”), not as something more impressive.
Generic internal anchors
“Click here” and “learn more” waste your easiest SEO lever. Internal links are the one place you fully control the anchor, so use descriptive text, including your target phrase where it reads naturally.
Long, wrapped anchors
Google’s documentation calls out anchors that wrap an entire sentence. Keep anchors to the few words that describe the target page.
Linked images without alt text
A linked image with an empty alt passes no anchor context at all. Check logos, banners and buttons.
How to audit your anchor text
You can do a useful anchor audit in an afternoon. Here is the process I follow for new clients.
1. Export your anchors
- Google Search Console: the Links report shows “Top linking text” for external links. It is free and comes from Google’s own data, though it is a sample.
- Ahrefs (Site Explorer, Anchors report) or Semrush (Backlink Analytics, Anchors tab) give fuller lists with the number of referring domains per anchor. My comparison of backlink checker tools covers the options.
2. Group anchors by type
Export to a spreadsheet and tag each anchor as branded, URL, partial/topical, exact-match or generic. Count by referring domains, not raw links, so one sitewide footer link doesn’t skew the picture.
3. Compare against competitors
Run the same export for two or three sites that outrank you for your main keywords. Your profile doesn’t need to match theirs, but large gaps (especially in exact-match share) show you where you stand out.
4. Look for patterns, not single links
One exact-match link from a relevant industry blog is normal. Forty from unrelated sites published in the same month is a pattern. Flag clusters of identical commercial anchors, anchors in languages your audience doesn’t use, and adult, casino or pharma terms you never targeted.
5. Fix what you can
- Links you or a past vendor built: ask the publisher to change the anchor to your brand name or a descriptive phrase, or to remove the link.
- Clearly manipulative links you can’t get removed: consider a disavow file. Google says most sites don’t need one, so read my guide on how to disavow backlinks first.
- Going forward: earn new links with branded and descriptive anchors to dilute the old pattern naturally.
Anchor text for internal links
Internal links are where you should be most deliberate about anchors, because there is no editor involved and no link-scheme risk in describing your own pages accurately.
- Use the target page’s main topic in the anchor, phrased to fit the sentence.
- Vary the wording across pages instead of repeating one phrase sitewide.
- Avoid using the same anchor for two different pages; it confuses which page should rank for that phrase.
- Put important links in the body copy, not only in menus and footers.
My full guide to internal linking covers site structure, orphan pages and tooling in more depth.
Anchor text on mobile and for accessibility
Descriptive anchors also help people using screen readers, which often list all links on a page out of context. A list of ten “click here” links is useless; a list of descriptive anchors works as a summary of the page. On mobile, make links easy to tap: Google’s Lighthouse checks that tap targets are at least 48 by 48 CSS pixels with enough space around them.
How to measure whether anchor changes are working
Anchor text is one input among many, so measure outcomes rather than the anchors themselves:
- Rankings and clicks for the target pages in Google Search Console, compared over the same date ranges before and after.
- Engagement rate and conversions for those pages in GA4 (GA4 replaced bounce rate with engagement metrics).
- Anchor distribution from your backlink tool, re-checked quarterly.
- Referring domains and authority metrics such as Ahrefs Domain Rating or Moz Domain Authority, as rough third-party indicators. Neither is used by Google. See my explainer on domain authority.
How I handle anchors on client campaigns
Because anchor text is where link building most often slides into manipulation, my SaaS link building services follow a few fixed rules:
- I audit the existing anchor profile before planning any new links.
- I suggest branded and descriptive anchors that fit the host article; exact-match anchors are rare and only where the sentence calls for them.
- The publisher’s editor decides the final anchor and placement. I don’t ask editors to swap in keyword anchors after publication.
- Links come from sites with real organic traffic (at least 2,000 monthly visitors), a human editor and a clean outbound link profile. No PBNs or link farms.
You can see the results of that approach in my case studies, such as the Zluri campaign, where organic traffic grew from 8,700 to 56,000 monthly visits over 14 months.
Summary
- Anchor text is the clickable text of a link; for linked images, it is the alt text.
- Google wants anchors that are descriptive, concise and accurate. It treats keyword-optimized anchors in placed content as link spam.
- A natural backlink profile is mostly branded and URL anchors, with a small share of exact-match keywords.
- Optimize internal anchors deliberately; let editors choose external ones.
- Audit quarterly and fix patterns, not individual links.
Want to know whether your anchor profile is helping or holding you back? Get a free link gap analysis and I will review your anchors alongside your competitors’, or see my link building pricing.
