Are outbound links important for SEO?

One of the checks we have in Yoast SEO is checking outbound links. This check reviews your text and checks to see if there are any outbound links in your post or page. In case you can’t find it, Yoast SEO advises you to add at least one output to your content. So why do we insist on adding a link to another site to your post or page? Shouldn’t you just have links to other sites on your site to keep people on your site as long as possible? No… Not by itself.

Do you want to check the red or orange mark for outgoing connections? Here is what this review does and here it is how to solve it.

What are outbound connections?

Before we tackle their meaning, let’s start by explaining what outbound connections are. There are several types of connections. When it comes to linking to other content, it’s important to distinguish between a few different types:

• Internal links go from one page of your site to another page on your site. So an internal link means that the user who clicks that link stays on the same site. These links they help site visitors navigate your site and also optimize your site for search engines. If you can use the help of internal networking, Yoast SEO actually comes with internal integration tool in a site structure course which can help you master the art of inner connection.
• And then there are External links going from one site to another. Of this, the link in the previous sentence is an example, as we link from our site to an article on another site, in this case the Moz site. You need to be aware of two types of external links:
  • Links from other sites to yours. We call them that input connections oz backlinks. When it comes to getting multiple links to your website, avoid bad practices as they will harm your ranking. To learn more about how to get relevant backlinks to your site, check out our article on a successful link building strategy.
  • Links from your site to another site. We call them that outbound connections. These are the ones that focus on outbound links in Yoast SEO, links from your site to pages on other sites.

What does outbound link verification do?

The checking outbound connections v Yoast SEO counts the number of outbound links you add to your post or page. It counts nofollowed in followed connections. Tracking means that search engines can follow these links, add value to an article, and perhaps rank it higher. Nofollowed links do not allow search engines to follow them to another site. Thus, they do not contribute or add value.

When you add a link to your text or click an existing link, a drop-down menu appears with the option to mark the link as untracked. But you’d rather see the tracked links! Therefore, we ask that you add at least one tracked link to get the green feedback flag. If you intentionally added only unattended links, the label for this check will turn orange instead of green. By the way, did you know that Yoast SEO also allows you mark links as sponsored oz ugc for user-generated content?

Link to your resources!

Did you get an orange or red return ball for checking outbound connections? Then color it green by adding at least one followed by an outbound connection for every article you write. But which sites do you need to link to? Well, ask yourself: which sources did you consult and which ones gave you the right answer? Or which sites have related content that is really interesting to your readers. Refer and connect with them because they deserve it. You want others to do the same for you. In addition, the right connection to your resources contributes to what is perceived Expertise, authority and trust (EAT) your content.

You need to choose links that are relevant to your visitors. And if you think your visitors might want to learn more about the topic and don’t want (or can’t) offer this specific content yourself, send it to someone who wants it. If we all connect to the resources we think are the best, they end up higher in the search results and we all benefit!

Why we want to add outbound links

At Yoast, we believe that every post should contain an outbound link. We feel this so strongly because it is our mission ‘SEO for everyone’. We strongly believe in equal opportunities for all in the connected web. Author he asks to add this outbound link, please link your site to the following site. And this site to the next site. This creates a web that expands and expands from one linked website to another. This helps Google connect the dots. Bingu helps you gain insight into which sites or rather what pages connected to each other.

By connecting the web and properly structuring the web with your help, we help search engines find interesting sites. We help interesting sites to rank on Google. With your help, this brings us one step closer to SEO for all. And everyone benefits from it.

That being said, there is another reason to add relevant outbound links to your content. As already mentioned, Expertise, authority and trust (EAT) which you represent on your pages is becoming increasingly important. A proper link to trusted sources will help you spend your content as it shows search engines that you are using the right information to create content.

So … are outbound links important to SEO?

Outbound links are definitely important for SEO. They are important to your perceived EAT and, more importantly, to SEO generally. Your connection helps your neighbor, your supplier, your customer and of course your visitor. And the more people contribute to SEO in general, the more you will have. Therefore, we firmly believe that there is a good reason to check them out in Yoast SEO.

To learn more about link building and other aspects of SEO, ours comprehensive SEO course and other SEO courses can help you with that. You can access these courses from Yoast SEO for Shopify in Yoast SEO Premium for WordPress. Our WordPress plugin also has an internal linking tool that suggests relevant pages on your site that you can link to:

Go Premium in you get free access to our SEO courses!

Learn all about SEO and unlocking many features with Yoast SEO Premium:

Get Yoast SEO Premium »Only €99 EUR / per year (excluding VAT) for 1 site

Read more: Building links from an integrated SEO perspective »