Anchor Text

[Pournima]

A hyperlink (or link) is a word, group of words, or image that you can click on to jump to a new document or a new section within the current document.

When you move the cursor over a link in a Web page, the arrow will turn into a little hand.

Links are specified in HTML using the <a> (anchor)  tag.

The <a> tag can be used in two ways:

   1. To create a link to another document, by using the href attribute
   2. To create a bookmark inside a document, by using the name attribute

[almedajohnson]

If the anchor text I want to target for my site is a two word phrase, does it hurt me to have additional words around those two words? It wouldn't make sense to a human if I just used the key phrase itself as anchor text. Yet I don't want to dilute the phrase....
Or does the anchor text length not matter as long as your key phrase is in it? (within reason of 3 or 4 extra words)

You can use as many phrases as you want because there is no limitation in using phrases. But yes there is limitation of 60 characters including keyword and link.

If your keyword are related to your content then user will understand the thing for sure

[guptaabhijit318]

Anchor text is the clickable text in a hyperlink. The anchor text is also identified as the link title. An exact match anchor text has the same keywords tinted as the targeted keyword of a web page. Anchor texts are one of the many signals search engines use to decide the topic of a web page, and can direct to an internal or external web page.

[PaulKegg]

Your anchor text don't exceed from 3-4 words.

[Brucey]

Anchor Text is the visible, clickable text in a hyperlink. In modern browsers, it is often blue and underlined.
The code sample for HTML anchor text is <a href="http://www.example.com">Example Anchor Text</a>

[TomClarke]

The reason why anchoe text length is important is because readers will notice links much more quickly and easily if you have sat 3-4 words as anchor than they would if you link only a single word.
But don't make it too long, it can be even less words if they are longer. It makes sense in theory. Maybe this will help out someone somehow.
If you're writing blog posts and you would like to see better engagement from your audience, try to change anchor text length that you're using for links to other pages of your website. Odds are good that visitors will notice the longer links more easily than they will  be more inclined toward clicking them.