5 Best Practices in Linking for Web Usability

The entire World Wide Web is built on links. They are the only way to navigate around a website; they are the way that Google delivers us its information-rich goodness ... without links, the internet would look very different than it does. Few people actually realize that there is a well established set of protocols for linking in terms of web usability, governing everything from when to use short URLs, to when anchor text is needed, what to write and the appearance of your links. Here we check out 5 of those best practices.

1. Using anchor text
   When you use anchor text for a link, you are embedding a hyperlink within text that is not the actual web address itself. Google uses the anchor text that links are embedded within as part of its algorithm which determines in what order sites will appear when you type in a search. Using anchor text is considered a best practice in some cases - it provides a description of the embedded link, which helps people decide whether it will be useful to click on.
2. Length of anchor text
   Make your anchor text long enough to accurately describe the content of the embedded link, but no longer. When you make a portion of text into a link it removes the readability of the text. People will either struggle to get through the sentence or paragraph, or will skip it altogether ... ignoring the link it contains in the meantime!
3. When to use non-anchored URLs
   Non-anchored URLs are almost never recommended - they usually contain combinations of numbers, letters, words and non-alphanumeric characters that are simply unintelligible to people. Visually impaired people using screen readers will have to listen to all that gobbledegook, too. If you must use your URL as a link, shorten it with a URL shortening service (see below).
4. Length of non-anchored URLs
   In many cases, it is considered best practice to shorten long URLs with a free, widely available URL shortening service. This means that email clients will not break the link if it runs over a line break, it will fit within the character limits of a Tweet or a Facebook status update, etc.
5. Alt text for images as links
   Keep your alt descriptions accurate, but above all, fairly short. People using screen readers won't get the visual impact of a picture simply by hearing it described anyway, and will find a long description of a simple image a royal pain.