Plan for Analyzing and Optimizing Internal Link Structure

[IWaldron]

I've noticed that our site has what appears to be a poor ratio of external-to-internal links. I know there are no hard and fast rules in SEO but generally I've come to understand that this ratio should be relatively balanced, and in some cases I've seen some correlation of high-performing/ranking sites closer to 70-30 (external-internal). I'm not going to get into specifics, but our ratio is well-below 50-50 (heavy on internal links compared to the volume of inbound external links).

My hypothesis is that this is diluting the link equity/authority for the domain. Moz's tools don't really provide any data beyond the initial data point of the volume of internal links compared to external. Being that I've never really gone down this rabbit hole before, I'm wondering if anyone else has ever experienced anything similar and could point me in the right direction.

Thanks in advance for any assistance or guidance!

[EGOL]

I completely disregard those numbers.  Completely.

On an informative site, I would use every genuine text connection in Article A as an opportunity to link it to other articles on the website.  If you look at wikipedia articles, you will see an example of what I am talking about.  We make those hyperlinks bold on our site becaused we believe that bolding increases the number of times visitors will use those links (and generates more pageviews that are monetized by ads).

On a retail site with related content articles we have two approaches.

1)  On the article pages that explain the use, maintenance, selection, etc. of retail products, we use bold hyperlinks to direct the visitor to: A) pages where mentioned items are sold (this is done to help visitors easily connect to a sales page while information about the article is immediate in their mind); and, 2) pages where informative articles about that same product are located.  This is very similar to the linkage on informative article sites.

2. On pages where products are sold we cut back on linking, and focus on linking only to pages were accessories are sold; and pages where important information about the item being sold is explained.  This decreased linkage is to help the visitor maintain their purchase intent, yet give them easy access to accessory purchases and the most important product information.