Clearing Up What a Link Title Actually Is

Ask ten WordPress users what a link title is and you will get several different answers, which is the root of most mistakes in this area. There are three distinct elements involved. Anchor text is the visible, clickable words in your content. The title attribute is optional metadata that appears as a small tooltip on hover in most desktop browsers. And the destination page's own title tag is what appears in search results for the page being linked to.

These get conflated constantly, and the practical consequence is that people spend effort filling in title attributes, which have minimal SEO value, while neglecting anchor text, which has substantial value. Getting the distinction right takes five minutes and improves every link you create afterwards.

How AAMAX.CO Can Help With WordPress SEO

At AAMAX.CO, we are a full-service digital marketing company offering web development, digital marketing, and SEO services worldwide, and WordPress is one of the platforms we work with most. We audit internal linking structures, fix the anchor text patterns that leave authority stranded, configure plugins correctly so metadata is not duplicated or overwritten, and build linking systems your content team can follow without needing technical support. Because we handle both development and SEO, we can also fix theme-level issues that cause link problems at scale rather than patching individual pages. If you want your WordPress site's internal linking working as an asset, hire AAMAX.CO for SEO services.

Anchor Text Is What Matters Most

Anchor text tells both readers and search engines what to expect on the other side of a link. Descriptive anchors help search engines understand the destination page's subject, which is why internal anchor text is one of the most controllable and underused levers in search engine optimization.

Good anchor text is specific and natural. Linking the phrase "technical SEO checklist" to your checklist page communicates something. Linking "click here" or "read more" communicates nothing and wastes the opportunity entirely. Keep anchors reasonably short, avoid repeating the identical exact-match phrase across dozens of internal links, and never sacrifice sentence readability to force a keyword in.

Setting Anchor Text in the WordPress Block Editor

In the block editor, highlight the words you want to link, press the keyboard shortcut for inserting a link or use the link icon in the toolbar, then search for an existing page or paste a URL. The highlighted words become your anchor text, so select them thoughtfully before creating the link rather than linking a word and rewriting around it afterwards.

Expanding the link settings gives you the option to open the link in a new tab, which should be reserved for external destinations and downloadable files. Forcing internal links to open in new tabs frustrates users and breaks expected navigation behaviour.

Adding a Title Attribute When It Is Genuinely Useful

WordPress removed the title attribute field from the default link interface some years ago, partly because it was so widely misused. You can still add it by selecting the link, opening the block options, and using the advanced or HTML editing view to insert the attribute directly into the anchor tag. Some SEO and link plugins also restore a field for it.

Before you do, consider whether it adds anything. A title attribute that simply repeats the anchor text is pure duplication. It is only worth adding when it provides genuinely supplementary context, such as clarifying that a link opens a large document or specifying which report a generic-looking link refers to. Never rely on it to convey essential information, because it is invisible on touch devices and inconsistently exposed by screen readers.

Accessibility Should Drive Your Link Copy

Screen reader users often navigate by pulling up a list of all links on a page, stripped of surrounding context. A page full of "read more" links becomes unusable in that mode, while descriptive anchors remain perfectly clear. This is the strongest argument for good anchor text, and it happens to align exactly with what search engines prefer.

When a link must be visually short, use an accessible label to give assistive technology the full description while keeping the visible text compact. Also make sure links are distinguishable by more than colour alone and that focus states are visible for keyboard navigation.

Common WordPress Link Mistakes

Several problems appear repeatedly on WordPress sites. Generic anchors across the whole site waste internal linking potential. Duplicate anchor text pointing to different destinations confuses both users and crawlers. Links to old URLs that now redirect create unnecessary chains, so always link to the final destination. Plugin conflicts sometimes strip or overwrite attributes, which is worth checking after any update.

Automated internal linking plugins deserve caution. They can save time on large sites, but left unsupervised they produce unnatural over-linking and identical anchors at scale. Review their output regularly, or restrict them to a small, well-defined set of rules.

Building an Internal Linking System

The real gain comes from treating internal linking as a system rather than a per-post decision. Decide which pages are your priority destinations, then make sure every relevant article links to them with varied, descriptive anchors. When you publish something new, add links to it from existing related content immediately, since orphaned pages struggle regardless of quality.

Keep a simple document listing your priority pages and a few approved anchor variations for each. It takes very little effort to maintain and it prevents the most common failure mode, where a valuable page ends up with three internal links while a low-value page has forty. Aligning that structure with your broader digital marketing priorities ensures the pages carrying revenue get the support they deserve.

Quick Checklist

Use descriptive anchor text that would make sense read aloud on its own. Skip the title attribute unless it adds real information. Reserve new-tab behaviour for external links and files. Link to final URLs, not redirects. Vary anchors naturally across the site. Link new content from existing pages on publication. Review automated linking output. And audit your internal links periodically to catch breakages early.

None of this is complicated, but done consistently across a few hundred posts it produces a meaningfully stronger site. If you would like that work handled for you, our team is available to help.