Links on all pages

I'm a web designer/programmer I build quality sites. I could offer a discount for a credit "Designed by..." link on footer but this is good for SEO?

I'm don't know much about SEO, or Panda and I could have lots of back-links, most of the clients are OK with this without any discount.

After lots of blog articles, link buying/building I have some SEO traffic and I get most of my of contracts through it so I don't want to loose my SEO rank, can anyone tell me if a link on footer is a good idea?

couldnt hurt to do so remember you cant control all your links

It's not a bad idea but it wouldn't be as good as say, a link in their footer linking to a dedicated page on their domain where you can add a unique article about web development and put the link to your site in context.

Context > Footer / Sidebar

MBW007 said:

It's not a bad idea but it wouldn't be as good as say, a link in their footer linking to a dedicated page on their domain where you can add a unique article about web development and put the link to your site in context.

Context > Footer / Sidebar

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^This is an excellent idea for that situation. Perhaps a homepage link going to that page on their domain, then to your site from there. Or a homepage link to your site and then in addition the idea that MBW007 had. I think that either of those would probably be better than just a sitewide footer link.