On-page SEO: internal/external links

If you look at WikiPedia they have a ton of internal links. Google likes internal links because it looks like you have more knowledge of the subject.

If your competitor has higher value quality external links, then they don't need as many.

HangTenSEO is spot-on with his answer. I'll take on the other half of the question. Technically speaking, all links where you are paid or potentially paid should be no-followed. However, Matt Cutts has said that Google pretty much looks the other way when those affiliate links are to big, known places (like Amazon). Always different rules for the big boys!

Counting links doesn't matter, like already said with the Wikipedia example.

The thing to pay attention to is keeping the internal links relevant across the site structure (SEO silo). Again, the Wikipedia example. Notice how Wikipedia will mention the same subject across multiple internal pages and connect those pages via relevant anchor-text. Relevancy is the key.

The typical small time site on the web will have random subject internal links which are lousy for SEO.

Wikipedia is a great example of well structured internal links in which educating the people from its various reputable sources in the web. Relevancy and weight of the links shows what website is really made for. The users.

I agree as mentioned in the discussion that the number of links are not important but the quality of links is important for external linking. You should always try to get backlinks from authoritative sites.
Secondly, you should always try to make the mixture of do-follow and no-follow links because it is more natural approach.
Thirdly, for internal linking your links should be well structured.

Google loves interlinking only when your all interlinking looking naturally. Before doing interlinking you must think twice and do proper interlinking. Quantity of interlinking doesn't matter if you are doing it in natural way. We have a great example of WikiPiedia.

Space out your links within your post/article and make sure all links are relevant. Internal links to previous posts you have written are good. Don't think too much about the number of links. Just make sure they are relevant and that your post doesn't look like most of the text are hyperlinked.

Firstly, a lot of profitable sites have a high number of links too, while others prefer to have fewer internal and external links. The truth is, its not really the number of links that matter, but the quality of these links. Fewer links from reputable sites are better than a lot of links from low-quality sites. I hope this answers your questions.

The number of internal or external isn't that big of a deal. It's more the quality of links that dictates whether your website is spammy or not.

If you are linking to high domain authority, high page authority sources usually even a big number is often fine. As long as the reason you are linking out makes sense and adds value to your content. If it doesn't that's when you get into trouble.

Same deal for internal linking. If the internal links are done to help users navigate your page better or improve usability they are good. If you are using them at random just for SEO again this will come off as spammy.

Footer links are usually fine as well, as long as your not trying to stuff all your main keywords there.

The main idea is not to overload the page with an excessive number of links, as this looks unnatural and may be overwhelming for a user in the first place. The structure of internal links should just be logical /relevant and shouldn`t cause any kind of confusion for search engine bots. Overstuffing the anchor texts with your keywords wouldn`t be a good idea either.

The quality of external backlinks matters way more than the quantity, so just make sure to avoid any spammy links and put effort into good ones.

A website must contain high number of internal & external links as it shows the linking of website with other sites that helps in strengthening the ON Page of a website quickly. The only thing to matter is the quality of the links that are linked to your website as it is highly important in increasing the rank of a website in Google search engine rapidly.

[QUOTE=BIBI15;10930169]Hello folks,

Today i compared my affiliate site to another blog in my niche and found an interesting thing which i want to share with you. Firstly i found that there are 100 internal links on my page, while my competitor has only 35 links. Same thing for external links where my competitor has total of 31 external links and me 55.

1) How do you guys think, is it bad to have so many internal/external links?

Internal / external links is just one of the task of on-page seo and by itself its not enough to rank you. Another factor is the quality of those links - what amount of link juice do they carry. Eg an external link to Forbes on a financial site can be compared to an unpopular site. Hope you get the gist?

Note: Actually i found that most of the internal links where generated because of footer links, where i have latest article and recent comment section.....

2) Currently all my amazon affiliate links are do-follow, so i need you advice whether to make it no-follow or not??[/Q

do follow links are better, but when all are do follow, then it becomes fishy. so have a mix up to make it look natural.