What anchor text actually is
Anchor text is the clickable text inside a hyperlink. In the HTML <a href="...">Click this</a>, "Click this" is the anchor. To the reader it is the link label. To the search engine it is a clue about what the destination page is about, written by the linking site rather than the destination site.
Anchor text has been part of Google's ranking signal set since the original 1998 PageRank paper. The idea was simple and remains useful: when other people describe your page in their own words, those words tell Google something about the page's actual topic. Many pages still rank for keywords that do not appear anywhere on the page, because the anchor text from inbound links told Google the page was about that topic.
In 2026 anchor text is still counted, but the weighting has been recalibrated heavily since the 2012 Penguin update. Exact-match anchor text from low-quality sources is now one of the strongest manipulation signals Google's SpamBrain system watches for. Distribution matters more than individual anchors. A healthy distribution gets the ranking benefit. A coordinated exact-match distribution gets the links neutralised.
Why the distribution matters
Real, organic linking behaviour produces a predictable anchor text distribution. People link to your homepage using your brand name. They link to specific pages using "this article", "their guide", "the report". They link using descriptive phrases that summarise what the page is about. They occasionally link using a phrase that happens to match your target keyword.
Manipulated linking produces a different distribution. Paid placements and link-building campaigns tend to over-use exact-match commercial anchors because the buyer or builder believes (correctly, in 2010) that exact match is the highest-value anchor. The result is a profile where the proportion of exact-match commercial anchors is well above what organic behaviour would produce. SpamBrain catches the pattern.
The implication is not that exact-match anchors are bad. They are valuable in small proportions. The implication is that you need the broader natural distribution around them, and you need to plan for it across every new link you earn rather than letting outreach campaigns concentrate the anchors.
The six anchor text categories
Every anchor pointing at your site falls into one of six categories. Knowing which is which is the foundation of any anchor text audit.
Category 1: Branded
The brand name itself. "The SEO Company", "TSC Perth", "theseocompany.com.au". Variations on the brand are still branded. The safest and most natural category. Most organic links from real editors use branded anchors, particularly for homepage links.
Category 2: Naked URL
The bare URL used as anchor text. "https://theseocompany.com.au/services/seo". Common when journalists or bloggers paste a link without writing custom anchor text. Reads as obviously organic and signals zero manipulation intent.
Category 3: Generic
Words like "here", "this site", "click", "read more", "this article", "their guide". The classic comment-link anchor. Low signal value but high authenticity marker. Real linking behaviour produces a steady stream of these.
Category 4: Partial-match
An anchor that contains part of the target keyword but is not the exact phrase. For a page targeting "Perth SEO services", anchors like "Perth's SEO specialists", "SEO firm based in Perth" or "their Perth SEO offering" are partial-match. Higher signal than branded, lower risk than exact-match.
Category 5: Exact-match commercial
The anchor matches a commercial target keyword exactly. For a page targeting "Perth SEO services", anchors like "Perth SEO services" or "SEO services Perth" are exact-match commercial. Highest individual ranking signal. Highest risk if over-represented in the profile.
Category 6: Long-form descriptive
A sentence fragment or full phrase that describes the destination. "The SEO Company's recent guide to Perth keyword research". "An interesting take on how digital PR has changed in Australia". Reads as fully natural. Used heavily in editorial coverage.
One additional implicit category: image anchors (where the link is on an image, with the alt text serving as the anchor signal). Treat alt-text-as-anchor like a descriptive category for distribution planning.
What a healthy distribution looks like
For a small business in 2026, the proportions we target across a typical inbound profile:
- Branded: 30-50 percent.
- Naked URL: 10-20 percent.
- Generic: 5-15 percent.
- Partial-match: 15-25 percent.
- Exact-match commercial: 5-15 percent.
- Long-form descriptive: 5-15 percent.
The exact percentages vary by industry. Service-area businesses targeting commercial local queries can run closer to 15 percent exact-match. Content-heavy publishers run closer to 5 percent exact-match because the natural editorial citing produces more long-form anchors. Newer sites should run lower exact-match because they are more visible to algorithmic checks.
The key threshold to remember: 15 percent exact-match commercial is roughly where the over-optimisation pattern starts. Above that, particularly when the anchors are clustered (many links arriving in a short period with similar anchors) or correlated with low-quality sources, SpamBrain neutralisation gets likely. Below 15 percent, even a concentrated month of digital PR with some exact-match anchors stays inside the safe zone.
The over-optimisation patterns SpamBrain watches
Five patterns we have seen trigger an algorithmic penalty in client profiles since the 2022-2024 spam updates:
Pattern 1: Exact-match cluster
More than 15-20 percent of inbound anchors are exact-match commercial. The single most common pattern. Usually the product of a previous agency's link-building campaign that prioritised exact-match anchors. Recovery requires diluting the cluster with new branded, naked URL and partial-match anchors over months.
Pattern 2: Coordinated arrival
Many links with similar anchors arriving inside a short window. Even if the anchors are not exact-match, the timing pattern is suspicious. SpamBrain reads coordinated arrival as paid or scheme-driven and discounts the links.
Pattern 3: Anchor concentration on commercial money pages
The homepage and informational pages get a natural distribution; the commercial service pages all get heavily exact-match. The pattern says "links were built to rank the money pages". Healthy profiles distribute commercial-keyword anchors across multiple page types.
Pattern 4: Foreign-language sources with English exact-match anchors
Links from low-quality foreign-language sites carrying English exact-match anchors for the target keyword. The pattern is obvious manipulation and the links rarely count.
Pattern 5: Anchor text that does not match the surrounding content
A page about cooking links to a roofing company using the anchor "best roofer Perth". The contextual mismatch is detectable, and the link gets neutralised. Editorial links almost always have anchor-to-context alignment.
How to plan anchors when earning new links
The framework we use across client digital PR and outreach campaigns:
- Audit the current profile first. Pull the existing anchor distribution from Ahrefs or Semrush. Categorise each anchor. Calculate the percentages by category.
- Identify the gaps. Where is the current profile thin? Most Perth small businesses we audit are too low on branded and naked URL (because they did not earn many natural links), and either too low or accidentally too high on exact-match commercial.
- Set the anchor target for the next 30 links. If branded is at 20 percent, push the next campaign toward branded anchors. If exact-match commercial is already at 18 percent, run the next campaign entirely on branded, partial-match and long-form anchors.
- Suggest anchors when pitching journalists. In your digital PR pitches, include the landing page URL and one sentence suggesting a natural anchor style. Journalists typically follow guidance because it reduces friction.
- Track the actual anchors used. Log every new link's anchor in your campaign spreadsheet. Re-calculate the distribution monthly. Adjust the next campaign accordingly.
- Vary anchors across sibling links. If you have multiple opportunities to link the same destination, never use the same anchor twice in a row. Diversity beats repetition.
For the broader outreach mechanics, see digital PR for SEO and link-building tactics. For how the distribution shifts under different attributes, see link attributes.
Common mistakes
- Auditing the inbound anchor distribution quarterly.
- Planning anchors before each new link earning campaign.
- Suggesting natural anchor styles in digital PR pitches.
- Varying anchors across siblings linking the same destination.
- Keeping exact-match commercial under 15 percent.
- Letting branded and naked URL anchors form the foundation of the profile.
- Pushing every outreach campaign toward exact-match commercial.
- Letting an agency run anchor strategy without sign-off on the distribution targets.
- Treating "more exact match" as better.
- Ignoring anchor distribution while obsessing over link counts.
- Trying to over-correct a heavy exact-match profile by stuffing the next quarter with generics.
Tools and checklists
- Ahrefs Free or Semrush Free. Both show inbound anchor text with frequency. Free tiers handle small profiles.
- Search Console anchor text report. Free, but less detailed. Useful for cross-reference.
- A categorisation spreadsheet. Anchor text in column A, category in column B, count in column C, percentage in column D.
- A quarterly review template. Distribution snapshot, gaps, next-campaign target mix.
- Your link-tracking sheet. Add an anchor-text column to the link tracker so every new link is categorised at acquisition.
For a quick snapshot of your current anchor distribution and any over-optimisation indicators, our free SEO audit tool includes the anchor categorisation alongside the link profile data. For the broader engagement see SEO services and website audits.
Perth and WA context
Three patterns we see in Perth client anchor audits:
Inherited exact-match clusters from legacy agency work. Half the Perth clients we onboard come with an anchor profile sitting at 25-40 percent exact-match commercial on the homepage and main service page. The cause is almost always a 2018-2022 era link-building campaign that prioritised commercial anchors. Diluting the cluster takes months but is the single most effective off-page recovery move. See website audits for how we structure the diagnostic.
Local commercial anchors that look exact-match but read as natural. "Plumber Perth", "family lawyer Perth", "SEO Perth" feel like exact-match commercial. They also happen to be the natural way Australians refer to these businesses in editorial coverage. The classification matters: a link from a Perth Now article using "Perth plumber" is closer to descriptive than exact-match because that is how a journalist would naturally phrase it. Treat the categorisation as a judgement call, not a mechanical match. See Local SEO Perth for the broader local context.
Industry-specific anchor norms. Mining services firms often see anchors like "FIFO accommodation Karratha" or "drilling services Pilbara" arriving naturally from trade press coverage. Legal firms see "family lawyer Subiaco" or "commercial lawyer Perth" from association directories. The exact-match-looking anchors in these categories are often editorial. See mining SEO and legal SEO for category-specific guidance. The location pages at SEO Karratha, SEO Bunbury and SEO Mandurah cover the regional anchor patterns.
Related guides
- Backlinks explained. The foundation chapter for understanding what your anchors are attached to.
- Link-building tactics. The tactics that produce natural anchor distributions.
- Link attributes. The other dimension of inbound link quality.
- Disavow toxic links. What to do when the anchor pattern is too far gone.
- Digital PR for SEO. The pitch process that lets you steer toward natural anchor patterns.
- Internal linking strategy. Your own internal anchor distribution matters too.
- Anchor text optimisation. The on-page side of anchor strategy.
- DR vs DA. Why the third-party scores miss the anchor story.