The Value of Footer Links

Footer links are basically the links down at the bottom of your website.  These are pretty common on a lot of websites, and many people choose to sell links in this position.

A recent interview with Matt Cutts (See Below) however revealed that Google may currently, and may in the future, class footer links as a lower quality to that of the in text, or sidebar, links.

A footer link is generally classed as a link at the bottom of a page, sometimes kept in a specific footer tag.  These links have often been the domain of cheap sales links, terms of service, and contact links. 

Footer links can still be good, however, they now may be 'less good' than before. Since footer links may be lower in value than before, then not only will they give less credit to those being linked to, but they will still reduce the value of your own page since it is an outgoing link.

This means that while a footer link is no different than any other link to the person who has put the link on their page, the recepient will receive a lower value link than one that was placed in the body.

Of course, Matt Cutts has left this open, he uses the phrase 'reserve the right' quite a lot, which suggests that if Google has not have implemented any of these changes just yet, they will be bringing them in soon.

Definately not!

Footer links still have a pretty important role to play, and are a pretty good way to place backlinks, without disturbing the cleanliness of your website.

Footer Links are still pretty similar to your normal links, but maybe it is better to use them for external only, or no-follow internal, links. You can use these and keep the quality of your pages high, with no detrimental effects on pages such as Contact, Sitemap, or Terms of Service.

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