Internal links
This is a key factor for "on-page" optimisation, though it is often overlooked by search engine optimisation practitioners.
Similar to the "citation" method of determining a site's content (see the Inbound Links section), the wording of a site's internal links helps the search engine spiders to determine what the subject matter of a particular page is about.
This link-wording is known as "anchor text".
The idea is that, if the V&A home page links to a page within the V&A site using the word
Fashion
- the spider assumes that the page that is being linked to is likely to feature content on the subject of "fashion".
Thus the page is given a little "boost" for the phrase "fashion" within the search engine's index.
The wording of each internal link should essentially reflect the main key phrase that is being targeted on the page being linked to.
If there are aesthetic or political reasons why it isn't possible to use the targeted key phrase as an internal navigation link, the link phrase should be used on an additional sitemap, in order to give the pages the required "boost" in the rankings.