Footer-links (navigation)

[JML1179]

I want to put navigation links in my footer. I watched the (distilled) whiteboard friday video saying it can be a penalty.

How are links in the footer different from links in the navigation. Why don't you get "hit" for putting the word "Real Estate Listings" in the navigation menu? It appears on every one of the 30k pages. I don't get why the links in the footer would have a negative effect if the links in the navigation don't.

My example is a real estate website. When people are browsing properties (30k), it is convenient that at the end of the page there is a navigation of areas. I could put the navigation on the sidebar but that would be in essence, the same thing. A wordpress site would dynamically include that sidebar on every page.

[Francisco_Meza]

Putting keyword rich anchor text in the footer was used by many spammers. It was abused a LOT to pass internal link juice.

"IF" you want to be safe, make those links in your footer a <nofollow>, that way you don't get penalized.</nofollow>