tedster - 5:22 pm on May 4, 2010 (gmt 0)

This is a tactic better undertaken when you launch - retrofitting keywords into the "Home" links at a later date has been known to cause penalties.

And then there's the usability factor. I helped launch two websites that used keyword links to Home. In one case all seems fine. In the other, the complaints came rolling in from the user-base that they couldn't find the "Home" page link.

To me, adding keywords to the "Home" links in order to improve rankings feels something like a "Hail Mary" pass in American football. If the keyword for your website's main theme is somehow a weak signal for Google, then there are other issues to look at: in your semantic page construction, the site's link structure. and even your backlink profile.

Let's be clear about this - it is essentially NOT adding value for your user, but instead it is designed in the hope of manipulating rankings. Even when it "works" I'd say Google doesn't want it to work - and it may not work for very long. It's far from a future-proof method.