Vary the Anchor Text or Not?

[Rammin]

Hi peoples,

I'd like to get your take on whether varying the anchor text when you're building links to make it seem "natural" to Google is a good idea or a waste of time, personally I think that it's a good idea (based on the fact that I heavily targeted a particular keyword which was initially ranking 20ish, and then went to about 400, though it could be for a myriad of reasons) but I'd love to hear what people think.

[phcarmaster]

You use anchor text to rank on that keyword. For google as long the keyword/anchor text is not that spammed it is "natural".

[grangonzo]

The "Experts" recommend to vary the anchor text to avoid penalizations.

You should use your "Main Keyword" in about 70 percent of the links and the rest to some other keywords.

Regards...

[intelinside]

It is good to vary your anchor text. You can go for a phrase keyword, then create its multiple variations but with your main keyword still in it.

[cassidywilliams]

If the website title and domain match your main keyword, then you can use that basically all the time. Otherwise if people link to Microsoft and use Microsoft as the anchor text, Microsoft would get punished! - which is a ridicolous idea. Using website's title as the anchor text is always natural.

If your anchor text differs from your title/domain, varying is a good idea.

[flashgordon]

I vary my anchor text a couple different ways, all targeting the same three or four keywords. Works well.

[robertstr]

Varying your anchor text means spinning your article that is better for social bookmarking. You can spin sentence by sentence or word phrase. Remember that your main keywords are not changed.