The next in my series on Google Filters looks at the Broken Link Filter. The backbone of Google’s search engine is based on links so it is no wonder that the Broken Link Filter is given a lot of attention. A broken link is when you link to a page that does not exist. Broken links usually occur as a result of either making a mistake in the link (ie missing a letter in the url) or the page expiring (it was up and was taken down and your link is still active. There are two kinds of broken links: internal and external.
Internal Broken Links

Google adds pages from your site to its index by crawling your homepage. The homepage links to subpages which in turn link to other subpages. As Google searches through these subpages, its crawlers makes a list and adds the pages. If your pages are not properly linked or if the links are broken then Google will not add your pages to the list. You can always create a sitemap that will help you, but again sitemap software uses the same crawling technology. I wrote a few weeks ago about the GSiteCrawler to help you build a sitemap. It is a free program that will also tell you when there are broken links. I use it every week to see which of the internal links I have on my site have broken down.

External Broken Links

External broken links are when you link to outside websites and they take their page down. You could, for instance, link to a fellow blog, only to find a few weeks later that the blog has closed and your link is now invalid. I have yet to find a good tool that will tell you when your external links are broken so if you have found one, please let me know!

Why This Matters

The first reason why the Google Broken Link Filter is important is obvious – if you are linking to your own pages and the links do not work, the pages will not be added to Google’s index.

The second reason why the Google Broken Link Filter is important is not as well known. Google wants to show high quality pages in their search results. The last thing they want to have coming up #1 for important keywords is a site that has old, outdated, and broken links. If your site is full of links that do not work you will be penalized for not having a high quality website and will drop in the rankings. This is especially important for your key pages. Make sure that none of your homepage links are broken and keep an eye on any links from the high Page Rank pages that drive traffic to your website!

Evan Carmichael