Do sig files attached to your message that are linked to your site help when posted on a message board such as this one? I have a couple other message boards (both are EZBoards) that I often post on.

I would think if it did help I'd have seen it already. But alas I haven't or maybe I haven't looked in the right place?????? Other than my weblogs or site stats.

It depends on the board. The board needs to be search engine friendly.
Also, some boards use a robot.txt to block the spiders (I know of at least one board that does that). If the search engine can index the pages then it would help.

Also, you get exposure if the board has a lot of visitors.

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Ok I looked around for the answer to my question first but of course I *may* have found it after I asked.

Sorry

Yes the board(s) do get a lot and I know that many times when I do a search for a users name or even mine threads that we have posted on will come up. But otherwise I seem to have zilch as for backlinks or link popularity.

What is the expression to use when searching for sites that link to yours? is it "link to:xxxxxx" or something like that?

Yes, they count, they show, and they help.

All of that, of course, varies with the board. But I have certainly seen sig-block links of mine show up in links: searches through Google (sometimes as from PR6 pages).

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If it isn't spamming, and it is a link, then it helps. By rule of thumb, I always add my link to my forum signatures and in my profiles. Even if a search engine doesn't pick up on it, somebody who is interested may cick it.

That's the great thing about link building. It helps for the SEs, but it also helps drive traffic, and can even help branding if done carefully. Nothing wrong with that as far as I am concerned.

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I don't think it does.......

I think all forums that have the ________________ right above the sig is disqualified from weight.....

I suspect that forums and topic descriptions work - but anything underneath the common default signature marking doesn't assign weight.....

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Here's a recent illustration, forums.seochat.com/t11474/s.html

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I haven't seen any SEO Guy BL's yet from the sig here. How long does it take for his links to show?

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"I think all forums that have the ________________ right above the sig is disqualified from weight....."

do you have ANY evidence that this is the case?

I think you're flat out wrong there. google wouldn't use a filter like that, since it's so easily avoided

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