Do page footer in-site text links help SEO?

[Mark_A]

On a couple of sites in the dim distant past I did this.

A footer with text links to the main pages on the site.

I figured what harm could it do and IIRC it seemed to help with rankings in the SERPS.

Do people still do this? and does it still help with rankings in G?

[keyplyr]

There have been a few discussions. I think most of them end up saying it's OK if it is done for the visitor's benefit and not to stuff intra-site links on the pages.

I use a footer with a few links in it: to my copyright page, to my privacy page and to my site map page.

Never had a problem (that I'm aware of.)

[vivek ahlawat]

Never a problem till the time it's contextual and relevant for the user

[Mark_A]

I suppose on here this actually is a silly question because on many webmasterworld pages there are loads of text links at the footer of the page.

In our site there are sometimes as many or more key phrase links in the footer than there are in the body text that somehow bothers me.

[keyplyr]

Yes, that scenario is not good. That could well be spammy to search engines. The tolerance for this has become more strict.

I strongly suggest removing all that.

As I said above... the footer should not be used to post intra-site links. Use a navigation system for that.