Are Internal Links In Footer and Header Treated Differently?

Google’s John Mueller recently responded to a question about whether Google uses internal links in the footer or header differently. Google’s John Mueller explained why the main content of a page is treated differently by Google, as well as how Google treats internal links within a web page.

Internal Hypertext Links

Internal links are links that lead to another web page on the same website from within the same website.

Internal links include menu links, which are typically found in the header, and links to important sections of a site, such as the about us and contact pages, which are frequently found in the website’s footer.

Internal links can also refer to other pages on the site that are accessible through the content.

Is it true that all internal links are equal in importance?

Internal links are important, according to Google’s John Mueller, and the person who asked the question wanted to know if there was a difference in how different types of internal links are treated.

The question was posed as follows:

“You recently emphasized the value of internal linking in informing Google about the importance of specific content on a site.

I’m curious if links within specific sections of a website are treated differently.

For instance, if a page is linked from a header or footer and thus appears on every page of a website.

Is Google treating those links any differently than links in the page’s body?”

There is no distinction between internal and external links

Links are not treated differently depending on where they are on a web page, according to Mueller.

John Mueller responded as follows:

“We don’t really differentiate there.
So if like, things are linked in your footer of the page and they’re linked from across the whole website then from our point of view you have those links from across your whole website.
It’s not the case that we would say, Oh, like links in a footer have less weight or are not as useful we will ignore them or anything like that.
So from that point of view, when it comes to links we essentially just see them as links on a page.”

Text is handled differently depending on its location

Then, according to John Mueller, text within the main content is treated differently.

He explained:

“It’s slightly different when it comes to text in there, in that we try to understand what the primary content is of a page.
And when it comes to ranking relative to the other content on your website, we’ll try to focus on that primary content section of the page.
But links from our point of view just help us to better understand the site’s structure and whether they’re in the header or in the footer or the sidebar or the main content, that doesn’t really change anything for us.”

Internal Linking Is Vital

Internal links within the header, footer, or main content are treated the same way, according to John Mueller, while content in the main content area is treated slightly differently.

Internal links in the footer and header are not given less weight than links within the content of a web page, according to Mueller.