undefined
Skip to content
Moz logo Menu open Menu close
  • Products
    • Moz Pro
    • Moz Pro Home
    • Moz Local
    • Moz Local Home
    • STAT
    • Moz API
    • Moz API Home
    • Compare SEO Products
    • Moz Data
  • Free SEO Tools
    • Domain Analysis
    • Keyword Explorer
    • Link Explorer
    • Competitive Research
    • MozBar
    • More Free SEO Tools
  • Learn SEO
    • Beginner's Guide to SEO
    • SEO Learning Center
    • Moz Academy
    • SEO Q&A
    • Webinars, Whitepapers, & Guides
  • Blog
  • Why Moz
    • Digital Marketers
    • Agency Solutions
    • Enterprise Solutions
    • Small Business Solutions
    • The Moz Story
    • New Releases
  • Log in
  • Log out
  • Products
    • Moz Pro

      Your all-in-one suite of SEO essentials.

    • Moz Local

      Raise your local SEO visibility with complete local SEO management.

    • STAT

      SERP tracking and analytics for enterprise SEO experts.

    • Moz API

      Power your SEO with our index of over 44 trillion links.

    • Compare SEO Products

      See which Moz SEO solution best meets your business needs.

    • Moz Data

      Power your SEO strategy & AI models with custom data solutions.

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
    Moz Pro

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

    Learn more
  • Free SEO Tools
    • Domain Analysis

      Get top competitive SEO metrics like DA, top pages and more.

    • Keyword Explorer

      Find traffic-driving keywords with our 1.25 billion+ keyword index.

    • Link Explorer

      Explore over 40 trillion links for powerful backlink data.

    • Competitive Research

      Uncover valuable insights on your organic search competitors.

    • MozBar

      See top SEO metrics for free as you browse the web.

    • More Free SEO Tools

      Explore all the free SEO tools Moz has to offer.

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic
    Moz Pro

    NEW Keyword Suggestions by Topic

    Learn more
  • Learn SEO
    • Beginner's Guide to SEO

      The #1 most popular introduction to SEO, trusted by millions.

    • SEO Learning Center

      Broaden your knowledge with SEO resources for all skill levels.

    • On-Demand Webinars

      Learn modern SEO best practices from industry experts.

    • How-To Guides

      Step-by-step guides to search success from the authority on SEO.

    • Moz Academy

      Upskill and get certified with on-demand courses & certifications.

    • MozCon

      Save on Early Bird tickets and join us in London or New York City

    Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints
    Moz API

    Unlock flexible pricing & new endpoints

    Find your plan
  • Blog
  • Why Moz
    • Digital Marketers

      Simplify SEO tasks to save time and grow your traffic.

    • Small Business Solutions

      Uncover insights to make smarter marketing decisions in less time.

    • Agency Solutions

      Earn & keep valuable clients with unparalleled data & insights.

    • Enterprise Solutions

      Gain a competitive edge in the ever-changing world of search.

    • The Moz Story

      Moz was the first & remains the most trusted SEO company.

    • New Releases

      Get the scoop on the latest and greatest from Moz.

    Surface actionable competitive intel
    New Feature

    Surface actionable competitive intel

    Learn More
  • Log in
    • Moz Pro
    • Moz Local
    • Moz Local Dashboard
    • Moz API
    • Moz API Dashboard
    • Moz Academy
  • Avatar
    • Moz Home
    • Notifications
    • Account & Billing
    • Manage Users
    • Community Profile
    • My Q&A
    • My Videos
    • Log Out

The Moz Q&A Forum

  • Forum
  • Questions
  • Users
  • Ask the Community

Welcome to the Q&A Forum

Browse the forum for helpful insights and fresh discussions about all things SEO.

  1. Home
  2. SEO Tactics
  3. On-Page Optimization
  4. City and state link stuffing in footer

Moz Q&A is closed.

After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.

City and state link stuffing in footer

On-Page Optimization
4
5
997
Loading More Posts
  • Oldest to Newest
  • Newest to Oldest
  • Most Votes
Reply
  • Reply as question
Log in to reply
This topic has been deleted. Only users with question management privileges can see it.
  • nkolson
    nkolson last edited by Jun 20, 2018, 3:52 PM

    A competitor has links to every state in the U.S., every county in our state and nearby states, and every city in those nearby states. All with corresponding link text and titles that lead to pages with thin, duplicate content. They consistently rank high in the SERPS and have for years. What gives--I mean, isn't this something that should get you penalized?

    1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
    • nkolson
      nkolson @MiriamEllis last edited by Jun 28, 2018, 5:59 PM Jun 28, 2018, 5:59 PM

      Thanks for your response, Will. It's small business (maybe 10 or 12 employees) at a single location. While they don't really impact me directly, it's particularly bothersome because they are in the advertising and marketing business. We tell clients not to do these things, but all around there are agencies that succeed using these tactics.

      1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
      • MiriamEllis
        MiriamEllis Subject Expert last edited by Jun 22, 2018, 5:11 AM Jun 21, 2018, 6:48 PM

        Hi There!

        Unfortunately, as both Ben and Pau are mentioning, this absurd practice is still hanging around the web. While it's very unlikely the stuffed footer is actually helping this competitor to achieve high rankings, it is aggravating to think it isn't preventing them, either.

        Your post doesn't mention whether this is actually a business model with physical local offices or is fully virtual, but what I have seen in cases like these is that big brands tend to get away with a great deal of stuff I would never recommend to a smaller brand. It begs the question: how can we explain this phenomenon?

        In the past, I've seen folks asserting that Google is soft on big brands. There could be some truth in this, but we've all seen Google take a massive whack at big brand practices with various updates, so that really makes this an unsatisfying assertion.

        Another guess is that big brands have built enough supporting authority to make them appear immune to the consequences of bad practices. In other words, they've achieved a level of power in the SERPs (via thousands of links, mentions, reviews, reams of content, etc.) that enables them to overcome minor penalties from bad practices. This could be closer to the truth, but again, isn't fully satisfactory.

        And, finally, there's the concept of Google being somewhat asleep at the wheel when it comes to enforcing guidelines and standards, and whether or not that's kind of excusable given the size of the Internet. They can't catch everything. I can see this in this light, but at the same time, don't consider Google to have taken a proactive stance on accepting public reporting of bad practices. Rather, they take the approach of releasing periodic updates which are supposed to algorithmically detect foul play and penalize or filter it. Google is very tied to the ideas of big data and machine intelligence. So far, it's been an interesting journey with Google on this, but it is what has lead to cases exactly like the one you're seeing - with something egregiously unhelpful to human users being allowed to sit apparently unpunished on a website that outranks you, even when you are trying to play a fairer game by the rules.

        In cases like this, your only real option is to hang onto the hope that your competitor will be the subject of an update, at some point in the future, that will lessen the rewards they are receiving in the face of bad practices. Until then, it's heads down, working hard on what you can do, with a rigorous focus on what you can control.

        nkolson 1 Reply Last reply Jun 28, 2018, 5:59 PM Reply Quote 2
        • paupastorlopez
          paupastorlopez Subscriber last edited by Jun 20, 2018, 8:52 PM Jun 20, 2018, 8:39 PM

          I've seen a lot of websites that do similar things and rank high on SERP's...

          Sometimes this can be explained in some part by a good backlink profile, old domain / website, high amount of content (if the content is relatively original and varied), or because the niche is more receptive to this type of content (when it's something relatively common on your niche)... and other times simply makes no sense why things like this are working in Google for years without getting automatically or manual penalyzed.

          Iv'e seen webs with so big keyword stuffing repeating a keyword about 500 times in the homepage, and being ranked in the top of Google for that keyword without seeing nothing internal or external of that website appart of this that can explain that awesome ranking. It's so frustrating knowing that this is penalized by Google and some of your competitors are doing it with impunity while you can't or at least you shouldn't...

          1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
          • Davey_Tree
            Davey_Tree last edited by Jun 22, 2018, 5:12 AM Jun 20, 2018, 4:56 PM

            Hi!

            Yes, this absolutely should get them penalized. Unfortunately, I have also seen this work very well for different competitors in various niches. Regardless of what Google says, some old black-hat tactics still work wonders and these sites often fly under the radar. For how long is the question though. It still carries a heavy risk. If they are discovered, they can get a serious penalty slapped on them or at the very least get pushed pretty far down the SERPS. It's really just risk vs. reward. If you are like me, I work for a company that has a ton of revenue at stake, so I think of it like this.

            It is much easier for me to explain to them why these thin, low-quality sites are ranking because of a loophole than it would be for me to explain why I got our #1 lead generating channel penalized and blasted into purgatory.

            Usually, these sites that use these exact-match anchors on local terms look like garbage. So even if they are driving traffic, I often wonder how much of it is actually converting since the majority of their site looks like a collection of crappy doorway pages. It is still very frustrating to watch them succeed in serps though. I have the same issue.

            You could always "try" to report them to Google directly. I do not know if this really works or if anchor-text spam would fall under one of their official categories to file it under, but you could try submitting a spam report here: https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/spamreport.

            I have no idea if this works or not though. Also as a side note, I would run their site through a tool like Majestic SEO or AHREFS and really dig on their backlink profile. I have seen a couple of instances where some spammy sites pulled off some nice links, so their success could also be attributed to those as well.

            Hopefully, this helps, I know your pain.

            -Ben

            1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 2
            • 1 / 1
            1 out of 5
            • First post
              1/5
              Last post

            Got a burning SEO question?

            Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.


            Start my free trial


            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.

            • See all categories

            Related Questions

            • sparrowdog

              Is a Mega Menu with over 300 links in it hurting my rankings?

              I got hit pretty badly by Panda 4.0 (1/3 of my traffic lost), and I'm fairly certain it was because Google had potentially indexed over 20 million pages from a site filtering piece of software and got done for duplicate content. I have since fixed that using URL Parameters and that 20 million is down to 2.7 million now and I have submitted a clean site map, so now I wait. I have just done a site relaunch and am trying to determine if there are any other issues. I run an online store, and I have a mega menu with well over 300 links in it - makes the user experience really quick and easy to jump exactly where you want - and then I have about 30 links in the footer. I know there's a 'no more than 100 links on a page' guideline for Moz, but does anyone know if Google is smart enough to see the same header / footer navigation structure on every page of a site and know it's navigation and not water down the rest of the links, or do I need to re-think and simplify my navigation? It's one of those things that's there for a user experience and now I'm worried that I'm being penalised. The site is www dot shopnaturally dot com dot au

              On-Page Optimization | Jun 7, 2014, 12:58 AM | sparrowdog
              0
            • HochKaren

              Best practice for Portfolio Links

              I have a client with a really large project portfolio (over 500 project images), which causes their portfolio page to have well over the 100 links that are recommended.  How can I reduce this without reducing the number of photos they can upload?

              On-Page Optimization | Aug 15, 2013, 12:52 AM | HochKaren
              0
            • OasisLandDevelopment

              What is on page links?

              Hi - i would like to know exactly what an on page link is? i understand the linking system however cant work what exactly what an on page link is? Thanks

              On-Page Optimization | Feb 6, 2013, 8:19 AM | OasisLandDevelopment
              0
            • AdamThompson

              Internal Linking - in content vs navigation menu

              Would like to get some thoughts on whether navigation menus or in-content links are best for internal linking, from an SEO standpoint. A few thoughts to get started with: For sites with a lot of content, you can have a navigation menu linking to your higher-level pages, then in-content links to deeper pages on your site. For smaller sites, this is not an option, as the navigation menu will probably link to all your important pages. You could add in-content links, but Google only counts the first link on the page, so the in-content links would be ignored if you'd already linked yp the page in your top nav menu. I can think of several possible reasons navigation menu links could be less desirable than in content links from a Google perspective. (They are sitewide boilerplate content without context.) If you setup your navigation structure based on what is best for the user, small sites don't have much wiggle room to optimize internal link structure, as all their money pages will be linked to from the top nav menu. Do you think Google prefers in content links to navigation menu links? If so, how do you get around the fact that for many sites, all their money pages are being linked to from their main navigation menu?

              On-Page Optimization | Dec 5, 2012, 11:57 AM | AdamThompson
              0
            • Greenpeak

              What is the best setup for conical Links

              Should I have the conical link state: 1. www.autoinsurancefremontca.com 2. www.autoinsurancefremontca.com/index.html 3. autoinsurancefremontca.com Also do you need a conical link on each page if you have more than one page on your site?

              On-Page Optimization | Oct 16, 2012, 1:41 PM | Greenpeak
              0
            • BistosAmerica

              Wordpress category links not working

              Hi All of sudden, my category links are not working. Any tips on figuring out what's causing this? Looks like permalink problem with newer wordpress version. I turned off all the plugins see if this cause any problems.  Still not being able to find any option. Here's my site http://www.hibebefetaldoppler.com/fetal-doppler-questions-and-answers/ Thanks in advance

              On-Page Optimization | Aug 6, 2012, 11:18 AM | BistosAmerica
              0
            • travelclickseo

              H1 tag in the footer?

              Quick question: I have been scouring SEOMoz.org along with webmaster forums looking for an answer, but we have a person who insists that the H1 tag be located in the Footer. I feel that is is fundamentally wrong because it is not the intent of the H1 tag, and I do not believe it is a best practice. That being said would we see what little value the H1 tag has disappear if we put it in the footer, would we be penalized, or am I being too vanilla by wanting to keep it in the Title position?

              On-Page Optimization | Dec 29, 2011, 6:51 AM | travelclickseo
              0
            • Buhrly

              My nofollow link is showing as a 302\. Is this OK?

              My nofollow link is showing as a 302. Is this OK? Not looking to pass any juice along but don't want to be penalized either. Thanks Buhrly

              On-Page Optimization | Jun 7, 2011, 1:59 PM | Buhrly
              0

            Get started with Moz Pro!

            Unlock the power of advanced SEO tools and data-driven insights.

            Start my free trial
            Products
            • Moz Pro
            • Moz Local
            • Moz API
            • Moz Data
            • STAT
            • Product Updates
            Moz Solutions
            • SMB Solutions
            • Agency Solutions
            • Enterprise Solutions
            Free SEO Tools
            • Domain Authority Checker
            • Link Explorer
            • Keyword Explorer
            • Competitive Research
            • Brand Authority Checker
            • Local Citation Checker
            • MozBar Extension
            • MozCast
            Resources
            • Blog
            • SEO Learning Center
            • Help Hub
            • Beginner's Guide to SEO
            • How-to Guides
            • Moz Academy
            • API Docs
            About Moz
            • About
            • Team
            • Careers
            • Contact
            Why Moz
            • Case Studies
            • Testimonials
            Get Involved
            • Become an Affiliate
            • MozCon
            • Webinars
            • Practical Marketer Series
            • MozPod
            Connect with us

            Contact the Help team

            Join our newsletter
            Moz logo
            © 2021 - 2025 SEOMoz, Inc., a Ziff Davis company. All rights reserved. Moz is a registered trademark of SEOMoz, Inc.
            • Accessibility
            • Terms of Use
            • Privacy

            Looks like your connection to Moz was lost, please wait while we try to reconnect.