If you have worked in website design, you’ll understand how a footer functions. It’s a useful section at the bottom of the page for quick snippets of information and URL links to other content. However, did you know the importance of the footer for SEO purposes? Don’t worry if you don’t know; many people overlook the footer SEO correlation!
In fact, the footer itself is often overlooked. It’s at the bottom of the page – so is it really that big of a deal for your audience and Google? Short answer: yes. Due to the way it serves as an extension of your website’s top navigation, providing a clear roadmap to the rest of your content, the footer is an integral component of your site’s architecture.
With this in mind, the following will cover the importance of footer for SEO, SEO footer best practices, and more!
Why Is Footer SEO Important?
Optimising the footer is important for a number of reasons. First of all, it is useful for your users as it provides them with helpful links and information. Additionally, it’s also a great way to boost your website’s ranking with search engines.
The last thing you want is for visitors to get lost while browsing your website. If this occurs, they will get frustrated and decide to look for what they want elsewhere – possibly on a competitor’s site (and you wouldn’t want that!)
When refining your SEO footer efforts, however, you can turn this potential weakness into a net positive for your site. With an excellent website footer, visitors will find it a breeze to navigate your platform and find the content they seek. The result: they stick around for longer, which in return reduces your bounce rate.
Want to see some SEO footer examples? While we’re not ones to typically toot our own horns, take a little scroll down the page. Here, you’ll see the Click Intelligence footer. It’s not fancy, but it supplies a healthy collection of links, a sprinkle of business info and some contact options – exactly what you want from a footer.
Now you know the importance of an SEO footer, it’s time to learn how to improve this part of your site. Ready? Below are some key footer SEO recommendations.
SEO Footer Best Practices
Assess Current Performance
Do you have to make changes to your current footer SEO? If you haven’t analysed performance in the past, it’s difficult to know what alterations – if any – are required within your site’s footer.
User session recordings and heatmaps are helpful tools for learning more about your footer’s performance. If these tools highlight a lack of activity, this could mean one of two things. It could be because visitors are not reaching the bottom of your site, or the footer is not delivering anything of value. If it’s the latter, you know for certain that modifications are necessary to up your footer SEO performance.
Know Your Code
You need to know how to work with your SEO footer code before making any significant changes. Sure, most site-building platforms allow you to customise the footer without delving into any confusing coding. However, this approach limits the potential to turn the footer into the optimised slab of site content you want.
As for what is footer code for SEO in simple terms, this is the framework for the content it will feature. There are various ways to edit the footer code, from implementing widgets to editing the code manually. While the latter makes it possible to tweak it in whatever way you see fit, ensure you know what you’re doing before reworking the code yourself – or at least make plenty of backups along the way!
Go with Relevant Footer Links
When it comes to footer backlinks SEO function, your footer relies heavily on this particular element. Without the right collection of links, this section of your website will miss the mark – for Google and site visitors.
As for an effective footer links SEO approach, ensure you only use links that are both useful and relevant. One important tip is to avoid simply copying the main navigation bar. The footer should act as an extension of your main navigation, a “safety net” of sorts for visitors that haven’t found exactly what they seek while browsing through your site.
In your footer links SEO plan, you want to organise these links in an intelligent, thoughtful way. A giant list of links, one without any set categories, will not help anyone. A good sitemap in footer SEO keeps everything clear and allows you to focus on the links that matter.
Limit External Links
Another tactic with your footer links SEO strategy is not relying on external links. Although external links are not penalised, they don’t carry any weight for your SEO efforts. Due to this, you should only stick with the minimum number of external links – such as those directing to your social media profiles.
If you do add external links, a vital aspect of footer optimization SEO is to utilise the “nofollow” tag for each link. By doing this, you stop Google and other search engines from adding the destination site to their ranking criteria.
What if you discover another site links to your content via their footer – a low-quality site that you don’t want backlinks from, perhaps? As part of our footer SEO recommendations, we suggest you politely ask them to remove this link. Google’s Disavow Tool is an alternative option in your effort to prevent possible penalties.
Aesthetics Matter
When deploying your SEO footer strategy, it’s easy to focus on the technical side of things. However, you also cannot overlook the appearance of your footer. An ugly or jarring footer that stands out for the wrong reasons will be viewed negatively by users.
Not much is required for a visitor to abandon your site. It may sound a tad overdramatic, but an obnoxious font or colour scheme could be enough to tip them over the edge. Fortunately, an aesthetically pleasing footer for SEO purposes is not difficult to achieve. A split between the rest of your site is recommended, as is a subtle change to the colour of the footer’s background.
Need Help?
If you struggle with footer SEO or any aspect of your strategy, for that matter, remember that our experts can help. As one of the UK’s leading SEO and digital marketing agencies, our highly skilled gurus can attack all areas of your strategy to sculpt one that works – to get you ranking higher in search results and boost your website’s online visibility. If that sounds appealing, don’t hesitate to get in touch!
