Wiki Interlinking

[eRAZOR]

I'm running multiple Mediawiki Sites and I'm still not sure if it would be more beneficial to add links to the other Wiki Sites to each Wikis Sidebar resulting in all pages of all wikis linking to each other, from a SEO point of view. And if it is not, what would be a good SEO strategy for this case?

[vincevincevince]

Linking to authority sites (wikipedia) can be beneficial to your rankings; and might help you get some in return, where your wiki information is much more in depth or informative than would be appropriate at wikipedia.

[Quadrille]

The same rules apply to wikis as to any other site.

Look at the sites one at a time, and devise a linking policy for that site, based on related links that will be useful for visitors. SEs (especially Google), aim to emulate the visitors POV, and non-related links may lead to downgrading.

There's also the incest test - getting too close to siblings can lead to being ostracised from the community.

I use my other sites to help launch new sites - I'd be crazy not to, and I'd do the same kind of thing in the 'real' world - but once a site is up and running, I remove all but closely related links from my other sites. Much healthier for a site to stand on its own three feet.

For sites that use even possibly dubious methods, such precautions would be vital - otherwise if one site gets MRSA*, then all may be infected. And if it's streptococcus**, you could lose an arm and a leg. But keep all these things in perspective, or you may end up with a psychosomatic disorder***.

*The Internet equivalent is a bad neighborhood
**The Internet equivalent is a Google Ban
***The Internet equivalent is a 950 Penalty

[eRAZOR]

Excellent Post Quadrille and great that you mentioned it because I forgot to mention it: I am indeed talking about kick-starting a new sibling wiki.