Which linking is better for SEO

[Roni20]

Hi

On my index page on doamin, i have little hub with links to my freesites. Which linking way is better

<a href=http://www.domain.com/freesites/dir/>description</a>

or

<a href=freesites/dir/>description</a>

Or maybe it doesn't matter ?

Regards
Roni

[Greenguy]

You should never have the domain on internal links.

[Useless]

Originally Posted by Greenguy

You should never have the domain on internal links.

I do that alot, but I don't remember why. I can't remember if it's because I was told that it was good or if it's because I was told it was bad. Hmmm.

[cd34]

There is a theory floating around that says to link with the full domain to remove the questionable ability for the canonical hostname to be duped and make sure that all references in google refer to www.domain.com rather than some being domain.com, some being www.domain.com. Google's 'dupe' page detector seems to have gone a little wacky recently and has a problem with the ww., www., wwww. etc that some servers support.

However, I hate using full urls in pages and will never do otherwise. I do almost always do an absolute anchor, i.e.

<a href="/dirname/">

rather than

<a href="dirname/"> or <a href="../dirname/">

and if it is a directory, I always use the trailing /, so, I never do <a href="/dirname">

Although, if your server was configured correctly, <a href="/dirname"> would indeed redirect the person with a 301 redirect to the 'servername' -- presumably eliminating the canonical name issue altogether.

[Greenguy]

I was always told that it was bad because it forces the browser to leave the server, look up the domain & then come back to the server, causing speed issues & a general waste of time.

[Useless]

Originally Posted by Greenguy

I was always told that it was bad because it forces the browser to leave the server, look up the domain & then come back to the server, causing speed issues & a general waste of time.

Oddly enough, I think the theory (if I dare call it that) that I had read stated something like someone had thought it was easier or faster for the server if the full address was spelled out for it. The server wouldn't have to stop, scratch its head, and figure out where it needed to go to get the page. But that browser thingy makes sense to me to.

That's it. I'm confused.

[Useless]

Chris has the most posts of anyone with a zero post count - EVER!

[Halfdeck]

If it's an internal link for navigation, i link to "/dir/." If it's a link to domain root, I use "http://www.domain.com/."

[Maj. Stress]

Originally Posted by Roni20

Hi

On my index page on doamin, i have little hub with links to my freesites. Which linking way is better

<a href=http://www.domain.com/freesites/dir/>description</a>

or

<a href=freesites/dir/>description</a>

Or maybe it doesn't matter ?

Regards
Roni

Roni,
You don't say what you are trying to accomplish. Better for what? If you are trying to achieve better page rank (webrank, etc) absolute linking is the way to go. Think in the terms of pages and not sites. By not using absolute linking, you will split up your page rank between http://www.yourdomain.com/ and http://yourdomain.com/. Search engines can and do see the same page as two different urls. It it depends on how YOU link them all together.

[Bill]

I use a combination of both types of links, absolute and relative.

I think they each have their advantages.

The only thing I try to be fussy about is being as consistent as possible in the format of the links. For me this means always including the www. in absolute links, and always adding the trailing slash to all links.

The old arguments about server performance still have some merit, but servers are a lot faster nowadays than they were when those conventions were first started, and I tend to think they aren't as critical nowadays.

But, it's pretty clear that consistency in link format, to avoid duplicate penalties and pages ending up needlessly in the supplemental results, is a discipline that results in more dollars in the pocket.

[Linkster]

Having had my site split due to relative links because I also owned the .net and .org versions and Google with its latest "problems" determining canonical urls - I have removed all relative links and gone completely to absolute links - and it has helped my rankings in Google considerably - I believe there are at least 3 other linklist owners here that have recently done the same thing due to being dropped completely out of Googles pages for the exact same reason

[twthumb]

Originally Posted by Greenguy

I was always told that it was bad because it forces the browser to leave the server, look up the domain & then come back to the server, causing speed issues & a general waste of time.

Most browser/os/routers/modems have a dns cache today, this means they lookup the ip address of the domainname ones and than save the ip / domainname combination in a cache, this cache is than used for further lookups.

You can clear your cache by doing a "ipconfig /flushdns".

Personally i use relative links whenever i can, it makes moving a site to another domainname (or even another directory) much easier. For example a freesite can be moved without any changes to another domainname.

[abcdwebkate]

Originally Posted by Linkster

Having had my site split due to relative links because I also owned the .net and .org versions and Google with its latest "problems" determining canonical urls - I have removed all relative links and gone completely to absolute links - and it has helped my rankings in Google considerably - I believe there are at least 3 other linklist owners here that have recently done the same thing due to being dropped completely out of Googles pages for the exact same reason

I've had great results with absolute links. Absolute links let individual pages on your site stand alone. Since it is hard to move absolute urls, the content is less likely to be a duplicate.