Often when you finish a web design and launch it then you want to tell the world about the work you’re proud of. This urge is common, but how do you tell everyone and reap the benefits of the self promotion? Obviously you can add the work to your website or online portfolio, tweet/post about it, write a press release and sign the work with an Attribution tag back to your portfolio. We’ve all seen them, the “Web Design by SuperDuper Interactive” line at the bottom of a page – essentially a signature of your work. Artist’s sign their work why shouldn’t designers?
Example of an attribution link
First, you were hired to create an web design and brand (along with a usable interface!) for the client. By completing the work for them you are giving them that brand, not claiming it as your own. When you sell a painting you are still selling your image, not the buyer’s. This is main reason I don’t advocate using anchor tags – the brand is no longer yours, but transferred to the client.
Second, You are taking search rank from your clients. For most clients SEO is important, adding the ‘web design by…’ line does not benefit your client, even if you are adding a rel=”nofollow” property.
I understand this can be a powerful tool to obtain more work – but I think it is even more powerful to give your clients the best web design you can and then reap the benefits of referrals.
Honest questions:
1) What if you’re not hired to create a web design and brand? What if you’re just a *web developer* and not a branding expert/ui expert. What if the site is just for a silly club, for example? – I feel like a majority of “web design by so and so” links are on these types of low profile sites. So what’s the harm?
2)Can you explain to me how it takes away search rank from clients? – I agree, I don’t see how it benefits, but how does it hurt?
3)”And then reap the benefits of referrals” – Is the link itself not a referral?
You bring up some good points Eric.
1) I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a footer saying “web development by SuperDuper” If the site is for a small club, I can see this not being a big deal, but the context we are discussing is for paying clients, regardless if they are low profile or gargantuan corporations, they both deserve the best.
2) Search rank and everything involved is a huge topic, but the gist of it is that links out of a page pass their page rank to the sites they link to.
3)I don’t view the link as a referral, perhaps an unsolicited one, but I would say the link is definitely more of an advertisement than a referral, yes?
What I do is… I ask the client if he would allow me to place an attribution link on his page. If he declines, I drop the subject and leave it out. If not, I place a small logo on the page. That’s it. I always ask the client beforehand, and always agree to what they wish – they are, in fact, always right.