This walkthrough covers Linkilo's "Add New Auto Links" feature — set up a keyword → URL rule once, and Linkilo turns matching phrases across your site into internal links to that URL.
Step 1 — Open Auto Links
- In WordPress, hover over Linkilo in the left menu
- Under the Linking group, choose Add New Auto Links
At the top of the page you'll see counters for Keyword Rules, Exact-Match, Dofollow and Category-Restricted rules, then the Add a keyword rule form.
Step 2 — Add a target word
The Target Word is the keyword or phrase you want auto-linked. If you want the phrase "SEO proposal" to link to your SEO proposal guide, type "SEO proposal" in the Target Word box.
Step 3 — Set the destination URL
In the URL field, enter the page you want the target word to link to:
https://yoursite.com/seo-proposal-guideStep 4 — Preview the impact (new in 3.0)
Before you save, click Preview impact. Linkilo shows how many published pages currently contain the keyword and lists a sample of them, so you can tell whether "SEO proposal" will create five links or five hundred. Nothing is changed by the preview.
The preview also warns you when the real run may link fewer pages than the text match suggests — for example because exact phrase matching, excluded HTML elements or a category restriction is on.
Step 5 — Save the rule
Click Save URL Relation. The rule appears in the table below.
Step 6 — Choose your settings
Click the gear icon on the page to open the Auto Links settings panel. These options apply to new rules; each rule in the table also has its own gear icon so you can override them per rule. The main ones:
Automatically apply rules when I publish or update a post
On by default. Linkilo applies your rules to a post every time it is published or updated. Turn it off to apply rules only when you click Perform Scan.
Add URL to feed if it already contains this url?
Check this to add another link to the same URL even if the post already links to it. Leave unchecked to skip — recommended for most cases.
One link per post?
Check this so each target word is linked at most once per post. Strongly recommended to avoid keyword stuffing.
Select URL before insert?
On by default. Instead of inserting links straight away, Linkilo collects the matching sentences as Possible Links so you can approve each placement (see Step 8). More control, more clicks.
Set priority for url insertion?
Pick which rule wins when a sentence matches more than one rule. Ignore unless you need explicit ordering.
Add URL to feeds created after specific date
Restrict the auto-link to posts published after a chosen date. Useful for date-gated promotions.
Block particular category?
Exclude certain categories from auto-linking — for example your "News" category, so promotional auto-links don't appear there.
Further down the panel you can also limit rules to specific post types, skip individual posts, and list HTML elements (such as headings) that Linkilo must never link inside. Click Save when you're done.
Step 7 — Run the scan
After adding or editing rules, click Perform Scan above the rules table to apply them across your existing content. A progress panel shows while Linkilo works.
Step 8 — Review what was found and inserted
The rules table shows, for each rule:
- Target Words and URL — the rule itself
- Possible Links — shown when Select URL before insert? is on: how many matching sentences are waiting for your approval
- URLs Inserted — how many links Linkilo has actually added
The gap between "possible" and "inserted" is usually because of One link per post? capping each post at one insertion, or because you haven't approved the candidates yet.
Step 9 — Create links by hand (optional)
Click the number in the Possible Links column to expand the list. Each candidate shows the post and the sentence with your keyword in bold, with a checkbox.
- Tick the sentences where you want the link
- Click Preview Selected. Linkilo sorts your choices into Ready, Review and Blocked and explains each one — for example a sentence that already links to the destination (Review), or a post that would link to itself (Blocked). Blocked candidates are never inserted.
- Click Create Links to insert the Ready ones
Step 10 — Done
The rule keeps working in the background. New posts that contain the target word are auto-linked when they are published or updated (unless you turned that off). You can revisit Add New Auto Links any time to edit or delete rules.
Key takeaways
- Target Word = the keyword you want auto-linked; URL = where it links to
- Preview impact before saving a rule; Preview Selected before creating links by hand
- Tick options based on your needs — One link per post? is the safest default
- Perform Scan applies new or edited rules to existing posts
- Auto-links save hours of manual internal linking, but watch for over-optimization. Avoid the same anchor in dozens of posts.
See also
- How to bulk-import auto-link keywords with a CSV
- Auto Links vs AI Suggestions — which should you use?
- Improve the quality of Linkilo's suggestions
Last reviewed for Linkilo 3.0.0 (October 2026).