Do any of you read or visit the URLs mentioned in the signature? Looks to me that the signatures in this popular forum is being used just to provide backlinks for search engines. Interesting to see very very few of us have non hyperlink text on their signature ..
Erm isn't that why people visit forums? Along with learning and sharing skills and experience. I do visit some of the signature websites, but the reason why 99% of the people have signatures is for SEO.
On the day that I started using a hyperlinked signature, approx 50 members of DP visited my site. That number is now zero on most days, but it was 50 then. So, well... Ajeet
My testing has proven to my satisfaction that Google now ignores links in forums for the purposes of determining PageRank and keyword relevancy. The Internet Search Engines FAQ has received 195 visitors from DigitalPoint so far this month. Enterprise Storage Management has received 11, SAN Security has received 6, and GSM Security has received three.
I typically visit one or more of the sites posted in signature line when I am curious about one of the posters. We have posters whose knowledge I respect and those that I do not. Lets put it this way, there are those from whom I would not buy a used car. Sites generally emit same aura as those emitted by poster. Shannnon P.S. I hope and suspect, Will, you are right about forum signatures not helping out pagerank and SERPs. What do you think about them as quick means to get new site found by Google? Since I have some spites that are frequently spidered have always just added a link to new page from my own page so have never tried the signature priviledge to get new site indexed.
I visit other sites via signature links in forums (not just this one) all the time. I get a fair amount of traffic from my signature in forums too, so I know others are reading them too. If the link itself brings any benefit in terms of PR or SERPs, great. If not, that's ok too as I'm satisfied with the traffic that comes directly from the signature links.
I more than often take a look at the sites in the signatures. Since I am an online shopper, I am a customer of many members at this and other forums. The signature is a nice place to advertise. It is a known fact that signature links have little or no effect when it comes to search engine rankings.
I click on the blogs quite a bit as well. as far as sigs? sure, I click.. but usually not out of genuine interest. I want to know how people are making money do sigs do much for SEO? not really. I've got thouands of sig backlinks- the impact isn't even noticable.
Same, I find myself visiting blogs more and more these days... I do visit the links in the sigs, and as someone mentioned, tend to click on the adsense too. But Will, you're right... I used to get quite a bit of traffic from sig links, now hardly none... I probabally get 60-70 a day to my blog though... Which is nice
wow !! lot of responses in just 12 hrs .. !! I guess lotsa ppul do visit the signature hyperlinks ... thats really good.. maybe among the 4 links allowed we should put a link to the webpage which tells more about ourselves... the remaining 3 links can tell what we are trying to promote
Umm.... because it's been around for a while and I like it where it is. I don't have a good reason but it helps save bandwidth for me and works great. I have contemplated moving it though, but I don't see any good reason.
Hello nriweb. I see visitors from my sig lines on a regular basis. I've come to the conclusion that sigs don't help much for SEO anymore. Every little bit helps, though.