Internal Linking Question(s)

[JML1179]

Is it unwise to link internally to a page more than once on the homepage. I am reading that it is considered spammy. I am also reading that it passes PR twice to the internal page instead of just once...

Which is it?

Is there a way to stop passing PR to the "contact us" page. I watched an older video that Matt Cutts suggested a nofollow. Now I read that this strategy is a no no?

Which is it?

Thanks!

[Richard555]

Hi I would not worry if you have 2 links to the same page, especially if one is in your global nav. You can add a no follow however I would not worry about it. Many websites have the contact us in the global nav - Google knows about navigation items so instead pays more attention to links in the body of the pages. Google will only follow one instance of a link so it won't double up on the link juice being sent to the next page.. Finally dont have too many links on your home page - the page only has a certain amount of link juice so you end up diluting the juice too much if you have loads of links. All the best Nigel

[Cyrus-Shepard]

It's generally best practice to link in a way that's best for the user. As Nigel noted, it's common to have more than one link to the same page - especially if one is a navigation link. There's nothing wrong with this, but keep in mind that Google puts more weight on the first link to a page than second or third links.

Instead of stopping link-juice to your Contact page, how about making sure that link juice flows back to your most important pages? You could easily link to top resources on your site that your audience may be looking for, and this could benefit both your users and how Google views your site. (nofollow link sculpting was a practice popular a few years back, but it's not really used anymore by most SEOs)

Since you're leaning on-page SEO, here's a video Rand did you might like:

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/getting-onpage-seo-right-in-2012-and-beyond-whiteboard-friday

Hope this helps! Best of luck with your website.