Internal linking means creating hyperlinks that point from one page on your domain to another page on the same domain. When you link from your homepage to a service page, or from a blog post to a related guide, that's an internal link. Search engines follow these links to discover pages, understand how your content relates, and determine which pages are most important based on how many internal links point to them. Internal links serve two main functions. For users, they create pathways to discover related content and navigate your site logically. For search engines, they establish your site's hierarchy and pass what we call link equity or PageRank between pages. A page with many quality internal links pointing to it signals to Google that it's important, which can boost its rankings. The structure matters significantly. Your most important pages—typically service pages or key category pages—should receive internal links from multiple relevant sources. In our 500+ domain portfolio, we typically see the best results when cornerstone pages receive 10-25 internal links from contextual sources, not just navigation menus. Blog posts linking to service pages with relevant anchor text consistently outperform sites that only link through their header navigation. Anchor text is the clickable text in the link, and it should describe what the destination page is about. Instead of generic "click here" or "read more," use descriptive phrases like "Ottawa SEO services" or "technical site audit checklist." Avoid over-optimization by varying your anchor text naturally and not forcing exact-match keywords into every link. Common mistakes include orphaned pages that have zero internal links pointing to them, creating link loops that don't serve user intent, and building massive footer link blocks that Google largely ignores. We audit internal linking by crawling the site with tools like Screaming Frog, identifying orphans, analyzing link distribution, and ensuring important pages aren't buried five clicks deep from the homepage. Strategic internal linking can redistribute existing authority without building a single external backlink.