How useful are links in the signatures on various forums, such as this one? Does it help you get indexed? Do they count as backlinks? Is it possible for signature links to hurt your website search engine ranking at all?

I'm not totally sure. I've seen a few of my signature links get indexed in Google pretty quick on bigger forums but that's about it. I don't think it hurts you at all though.

Well, first of all, people might click on your links.

If you provide good info that people can use they will usually click on the links in your sig to see what other advice you have. Also, if the sigs are available to the SE spiders you will also get some backlinks.

Depends on how popular a member you are. You can get a ton of clicks from a popular poster.

Also depends on if the forum allows signitures to be spidered.

My sigs over at DP have always helped a lot.

I definitely think that forum signatures really help in promoting a site, especially when they stand out :-D

I think they help quite a bit, if you use them effectively and make a number of posts its a free way to advertise. Although after a while it does slow down a people find out what is behind the link. Although my sig only links to my portfolio I still get many unique visitors. Helps quite a bit for advertising my services.

Another thing to consider is that some forums have rel=nofollow links.

Originally Posted by Lpspider

Another thing to consider is that some forums have rel=nofollow links.

not this one

Originally Posted by Matthew

not this one

Fortunately, yes.

Originally Posted by Lpspider

Fortunately, yes.

Agreed, yes, and that is good to hear!

Originally Posted by Dr. Domaining

Agreed, yes, and that is good to hear!

It is, because hopefully this forum will be getting some very high Page Rank in the near future

I do think they count as backlinks and that is good for PR right?

As ads they are useless I think, you might get some members checking you out just for their curiosity. But as always it depends on what kind of forum and what product/service you offer.

//Andreas

Originally Posted by Andreas Bard

I do think they count as backlinks and that is good for PR right?

As ads they are useless I think, you might get some members checking you out just for their curiosity. But as always it depends on what kind of forum and what product/service you offer.

//Andreas

I don't think they are useless for ads. Especially if you have the right target.

I think links in signatures can help promoting the site and I always check some signature links

It really depends on the forum you're posting on I think. You have some generic seo tagline and you post on a webmaster forum, probably not that effective. Take that same sig and post on a forum with a lot of noobs and you'll probably get quite a bit more clicks.

Signature links are very useful and can be extremely effective if you use them correctly...that's where I got that vast majority of my traffic in its early stages...it's all about creating the right signature (one that gets the message across, but still leaves something of interest), posting in the right forums, and posting the right material...if you post good, quality messages, people will begin to notice...and then they'll begin to notice your signature also :yes:

I do click alot of sig links, but rare to actually sign up to a site. I just like a nosey to see how someone's site looks if I liked there posts. I signed up at GT's place because I read a few of his posts elsewhere and clicked his link.

Sadly I've never made the most of sig links though as I have so many linking to places that don't exist anymore and I never made much effort on the forums I have them on

I check where people come to my sites from frequently and quite a few come from my signature.

I've always been a big advocate of sig's. Couple of reasons why:

1. It promotes your site to users who are generally interested in what you do. You might not get a sale, but now your "the guy/ gal they know" who provides a certain service. Kinda like my cousin the lawyer, or car salesman. Referals come from anywhere.
2. Contrary to what I've read, as far as I can tell, there are no "no follow" tags anywhere in these pages. I've gotten a lot of valuable backlinks from forum posts, especially in the long run. One forum post I did on WPW years ago started coming up as a backlink when the thread got a PR3. And a small post I did at SEO forum about two months ago, shows up as a backlink. Mind you, they are not relative backlinks, but you get links where you can.

99% of internal forum pages are automatically PR0, so it's not much of a SEO strategy. But if you're using it as an ad...well that can help bring in traffic. Just won't do much for you in the SERPs.