Over-optimised anchors are one of the fastest ways to trigger a penalty. Here's how to keep your profile natural while still ranking money terms.
Anchor text is the single factor most likely to get an aggressive link campaign penalised. The fix isn't complicated, but it does take discipline.
The anchor types
- Branded: your company or domain name.
- Generic: "click here", "this guide", "read more".
- Naked URL: the raw link text.
- Partial-match: includes a keyword plus other words.
- Exact-match: your target keyword, verbatim.
What a natural profile looks like
Sites that rank and stay ranked lean heavily on branded and generic anchors, use partial-match sparingly, and keep exact-match as a small minority. If exact-match money terms dominate your profile, you're flashing a signal that your links are built, not earned.
How to apply it
- Audit your current anchor distribution before adding more links.
- If exact-match is already high, build only branded and generic until it balances out.
- Vary anchors across placements — never repeat the same exact-match on multiple sites.
- Let relevance, not the anchor, do the heavy lifting: a relevant link with a branded anchor still passes strong signals.
The takeaway
You rank commercial pages by pointing relevant, authoritative links at them — not by stuffing them with exact-match anchors. Keep the profile natural and you get the rankings without the risk.