Footer Links For Web Design Agencies - Bad?
-
So today Google have updated their Webmaster Guidelines and they have drawn particular attention to their update relating to Link Schemes. http://support.google.com/webmasters/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=66356
Unless you have had your eyes closed and your fingers in your ears since February then most people are aware of the types of link schemes that the updated is refering to but there is one area that isn't so black and white for me.
"Here are a few common examples of unnatural links that violate our guidelines: Widely distributed links in the footers of various sites"
We are a design agency and we design and build lots of websites for our clients. It is pretty standard practice for agencies to add a credit to the footer of websites and we pick up a lot of work from people that see a site that they like and click through the footer link to our site.
Our footer credit is standard on all of the websites that we create:-
Website by Teapot Creative
Only the 'Teapot Creative' part of the credit is anchor text so we are only linking using our brand name with no intention of manipulating search results.
Is this going to hurt us? or will the fact that we are only linking using our branded term and without any SEO intent keep us in the clear?
Thanks.
Ade. -
Hi Ade,
Just thought I would chip in here.
Our website took a huge hit during the Penguin update for this (to the point where we now are moving the domain to a different one). The reason for this was that every website we made had footer text going to our website and they were all hosted on the same server, with the same blocks.
We removed nearly all of them and it seemed that the initial damage was too much to recover from. All of our websites were spam free and we only linked via branded keywords, so I think the IP issue is really important here.
We have made it standard practice from now on to set up all new sites on dedicated IP addresses.
Hope this is of some use.
Matt.
-
Hi Kevin,
Thanks for your thoughts, I have spoken to several other SEO's and everyone seems to be of the opinion that we are pretty safe.
None of the websites that we have built are in any way spammy, they are generally business websites belonging to SMEs with, as you guessed, very few outbound links.
Your comment about IPblock is something that I hadn't considered. All of these sites are on our own server and so all have the same IP block.
Thanks again.
Ade. -
I think you hit the nail on the head -- the anchor text is a branded term with not much competition. Also, the sites that you design probably do not have that many outbound links (much less spammy outbound links). Because of those 2 reasons, I think that you will continue to be fine (you could always put a no follow attribute on the link).
One thing to also consider is if all the sites are on one IP block, it may be considered a link-farm and could hurt.
Would be interested in hearing other's opinion on this.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Pageless/Single Page Design and Migration Questions
Hello, We are starting a content audit and migration to a new CMS. We would like to take content and present more on a pageless/Single Page type design instead of having visitors drill down so many levels to find the content. What should we be aware of from an SEO perspective. Here is Example of current pages and structure: http://www.saintpetershcs.com/GraduateMedicalEducation/PediatricResidency/
Web Design | | sphcs
Subpages include: Overview, Curriculum, Faculty, Residents, Benefits, How to APply Here is example of what we would like to do:
http://themeforest.net/item/medicalpress-health-and-medical-wordpress-theme/full_screen_preview/7789703 As you scroll information is populated: Duke Medicine also has something similar. https://www.dukemedicine.org/treatments/cancer What are your thoughts?0 -
Web Editing Pricing Quote
Hi all, I cannot seem to get my pagespeed up to the level I want, but I do not have the backend knowledge to fix the following errors listed below. I have played around with this for awhile, and gotten a number of them reduced, but these last ones are beyond me at this time. Any idea how long this would take someone proficient to do? Any idea what the cost would be? I know the ideas are going to be super general, but ball park is what I'm looking for. Thanks! Ruben Remove render-blocking JavaScript: http://code.jquery.com/jquery-latest.min.js http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/themes/kempruge/scripts/custom.js http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/themes/kempruge/scripts/rem-text-input.js Optimize CSS Delivery of the following: http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/themes/kempruge/style.css http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/themes/kempruge/fonts/stylesheet.css http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/plugins/sweetcaptcha-revolutionary-free-captcha-service/css/style.css?ver=3.6.1 http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/plugins/nextgen-gallery/products/photocrati_nextgen/modules/nextgen_gallery_display/static/nextgen_gallery_related_images.css?ver=3.6.1 http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/plugins/contact-form-7/includes/css/styles.css?ver=3.5.3 http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/plugins/easing-slider/css/slideshow.min.css?ver=2.1.2 http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-nivo-slider/nivo-slider.css?ver=3.6.1 http://www.kempruge.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-nivo-slider/themes/default/default.css?ver=3.6.1
Web Design | | KempRugeLawGroup0 -
Website spread over two domains - The Good,The Bad and the Ugly ?
Hi, I am wondering if the way I have set up our website site is creating more harm than good ? All our SEO efforts and content is located @ www.sparrowmakeup.com.au however our portfolio is located at www.make-up-artists.com.au. Questions ? Will Analytic bounce rates effect my SERP, as most people click on the portfolio link in the first 5-15 sec of landing on our page ?? Is there a better way of setting it up ? the reason I set it up like this in the first place was because we wanted a different look/theme for the portfolio. (using WP) Is there any other issues that this setup might have in the SEO / SERP department ?? Is there any benefits and how can I maximize on them (silver lining) Your help and experience is greatly appreciated. Regards Ed
Web Design | | EdsonGroupMedia0 -
Web Design and Development Leads
Friends, Even though we get organic leads related to Web Design and Development we are looking for other sources to buy real time leads related to Web Design and Development. Any pointers are much appreciated. Thank you
Web Design | | INN
Chris0 -
Just How Bad is Adobe MUSE for SEO?
Adobe's new website builder "Adobe Muse" has a reputation for creating terrible code. I want to know if anyone has experience with the software and what your opinion is on just how bad the code really is for SEO. I'm currently using "Weebly", which is a similar, but more basic website building software. My results for SEO have been going well using that software, however it's limited in terms of building an aesthetically pleasing website design. On the other hand, you can build gorgeous websites with Adobe Muse, but I don't want to use it if it's going to prevent me from ranking. What are your thoughts?
Web Design | | Alchemist230 -
What are the top web design agencies?
I have a big client who is looking to have some design work done on their websites. Really just redoing them essentially. They were asking me who the top web design companies in the country are. Anyone have any suggestions? Who are the most renown agencies?
Web Design | | DanDeceuster0 -
Best way to handle related content links in a sidebar?
My site contains tens of thousands of articles, studies, multimedia files, biographies, etc. To assist users with finding content that might be related to the page they're on, I use a side bar with 'also of interest' links to other, similar content on my site. This is, of course, pretty standard practice. Search engines -- Google in particular -- index these pages and then include the text in the sidebar links in search results. So, for example, on a given page I may have 20 links to related content, and the text in those links might be, 'A story about subject ABC.' When I search for 'A story about subject ABC,' Google returns not only the page titled (and containing the content) 'A story about subject ABC.' but also every page that links to it and happens to have that link text in the sidebar. What is the proper way to handle this kind of thing?
Web Design | | smorrison0 -
Where to find high quality (affordable) web designers?
Hi everyone, I am looking for find high quality web designers that are affordable. I am open to many options. There are several things I have looked into. 1. I have looked for designers via CSS galleries, but I don't really know how to get in touch with designers or find them. Rand recently talked about this in a webinar, but if anyone has specific insights on how to find people this way, please let me know. 2. I have also looked into website design contests from sites such as: DesignCrowd.com 99designs.com CrowdSpring.com DesignContest.com I haven't used these services and I was wondering if anyone has experience with design contests. 3. I have looked into the option of hiring a freelancer on oDesk or a similar freelancer site. I don't really know the cost, how to find a good designer, how to avoid inexperienced but cheap designers and all the other such roadblocks that come along with freelancers. If anyone could provide insight into this, it would be greatly appreciated.
Web Design | | alexhoug0