Adding your agency logo to a site you've designed. Faux pas or ranking imperative?

[seaniaaa]

So, I'm reading the QRG again (no skimming this time) and something stuck out to me. There's a section about identifying who the site owners are AND who the content creators are. In fact, it's the first thing raters are instructed to do. Do we think then, that hiding your agency info in the footer immediately puts you at a disadvantage? Or do we think the raters proceed assuming the business itself created the site? Has anyone done any testing between hiding and displaying their agency info in the footer?
Edit: as I read more I think it matters less as businesses can be both the owner and content creator. Still though, any thoughts on the pros and cons would be appreciated!

 

[Conor Treacy]

I would assume (possibly bad on my part) that the "Content Creator" is more about the Author of said piece and less about the person maintaining the site.

So if the author is also your agency name, then that would lead to the attribution, but a "design by" or "maintained by" type text or logo in the footer wouldn't normally play into the raters guideline.

Again, that's my assumption. I never gave it any deep dive.

 

[seaniaaa]

I would assume (possibly bad on my part) that the "Content Creator" is more about the Author of said piece and less about the person maintaining the site.

So if the author is also your agency name, then that would lead to the attribution, but a "design by" or "maintained by" type text or logo in the footer wouldn't normally play into the raters guideline.

Again, that's my assumption. I never gave it any deep dive.

What about outside of the QRG? Have you seen any data backed arguments for or against including agency branding on websites? I tried to look around for some the other day but came up empty.

 

[Conor Treacy]

What about outside of the QRG? Have you seen any data backed arguments for or against including agency branding on websites? I tried to look around for some the other day but came up empty.

I haven't. The general consensus is that a link in the footer is a sitewide link, so it wouldn't pass any juice to other sites. I tend to be in that camp, but all the same, a link is a link We don't put logos/graphics., at the bottom of the page, but we do put "design by" or "WordPress Design" and various other phrases. Font size is usually small (12px) and doesn't interfere with the design or user navigation. All clients are asked if we can put it there, and we have only had a couple in the last 20 years that have asked not to put it on.

We have received a couple of calls over the years of someone saying they saw we did "X" website - but those are very rare, so it's not a marketing thing either in that sense, but it does let us use the site in a portfolio and have our "stamp" on the design as proof we did it. Of course, clients change sites and break designs too, so there's that caveat also to worry about

But I've not seen any data about the effectiveness of a link or logo in a footer.

 

[JeffClevelandTN]

Of course, clients change sites and break designs too, so there's that caveat also to worry about

Like Conor, we've received some phone calls over the years because our name was in the footer but likewise there are some websites that we designed and continue to maintain (to some degree) where the client has a new employee that considers themself a "designer" and totally messes up the site. In cases like that we will remove our info from the site. Lately, we've only been including our name on sites that we fully maintain, just because we don't routinely check the websites that we maintain based on an incident/hourly basis.

IMO, I think that having a logo would be a little overreaching.

However, I've never really given any thought about what Google thinks about these types of links until seeing this post. If you look at Google's recommendations, specifically under the section of "Link Spam", they indicate such links do need to be qualified with a nofollow: Spam Policies for Google Web Search | Google Search Central | Documentation | Google Developers

 

[12hourseo]

It is a bit of a design choice and that depends on the decision of your client.
If your client finds it tacky, then it might be best to avoid adding your logo onto your site.
Otherwise, you can probably add your logo onto the sites that you are serving.