Footer backlink for/to Web Design Agency
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I read some old (10+ years) information on whether footer backlinks from the websites that design agencies build are seen as spammy and potentially cause a negative effect.
We have over 150 websites that we have built over the last few years, all with sitewide footer backlinks back to our homepage (designed and managed by COMPANY NAME).
Semrush flags some of the links as potential spammy links.
What are the current thoughts on this type of footer backlink?
Are we better to have 1 dofollow backlink and the rest of the website nofollow from each domain?
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@MultiAdE Sitewide footer backlinks to your homepage hold value, but maintaining balance is crucial. If Semrush flags potential spam, assess quality and relevance. One solution is to have one dofollow backlink while making the others nofollow. This helps mitigate negative effects while still maintaining a reasonable link presence. Remember to prioritize high-quality, relevant backlinks that enhance user value. Stay updated, avoid spam signals, and craft an effective strategy for long-term success.
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@MultiAdE I personally don't believe removing them is a good idea unless you experience a great deal of negative difference in SERPs.
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@MultiAdE Truth be told, it is better to avoid such references so that there are no negative consequences. At the moment everything is fine, but if there are a lot of them, and Google suddenly adds an innovation, it will be unpleasant.
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The latest insights are that Google will discard most sidewide links. The time of Google delivering penalties for this kind of behavior is behind us.
So unless you have terrible rankings and or warnings in Search console let it be.
Best practice for the future is to limit the amount of sidewide links to the necessary ones. Also it looks a bit spammy for the clients. "design by Company" is enough, if at all.
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In our case we saw it happening both on Moz and Semrush.
Of course this must be a false positive. I haven't read in any official google page/post that we shouldn't do that.
Just imagine what will happen to your Domain Authority Score if you remove 200 unique backlinks...
So we just ignore it and move on.
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