Linking to your sources: Crawl Audit check 30

Short answer: check 30 passes if the page links to any other website. Since social icons in a footer count, most sites pass. The habit it points at is worth more than the check: when your page states a fact you got from somewhere, link to where you got it. Readers can check you, and you look like someone who has nothing to hide.

What Crawl Audit checks

Crawl Audit counts the links on the page whose href starts with http and points to a different domain from yours (ignoring www.).

• Pass: at least one, with the count.
• Warning: none.

Footer links to Instagram or LinkedIn count, so a pass doesn't mean the page sources its claims. Look at your main text for that.

Why sourcing matters

• Google's guide to helpful content lists, among the signs of a page people can trust, "clear sourcing".
• Google's Search Quality Rater Guidelines say "Trust is the most important member of the E-E-A-T family". In one worked example, the raters note: "The citations support the E-E-A-T of this article." A low-rated example is marked down because "The article fails to cite sources".

AI answers make sources visible too. OpenAI says ChatGPT "Responses that use web search may include citations"; Perplexity says "Each answer includes numbered citations linking to the original sources"; Claude's help centre says "Every response includes citations". Linking out doesn't guarantee anything there. But a page that shows where its facts come from is easier for anyone, person or machine, to trust.

How to link out well

• Link the claim, not a vague phrase. "Google removed FAQ rich results in May 2026" links to Google's changelog, not to "click here".
• Prefer the original source: the regulator, the vendor's documentation, the study itself.
• Label paid and user-generated links. Google asks you to "Mark links that are advertisements or paid placements (commonly called paid links) with the sponsored value", to mark "user-generated content (UGC) links, such as comments and forum posts, with the ugc value", and to use nofollow "when other values don't apply".

Every explainer on this site, this one included, ends with a Sources list linking to the documentation each fact came from.

Sources

• Google Search Central, Creating helpful, reliable, people-first content and Qualify your outbound links, checked 3 October 2026.
• Google, Search Quality Rater Guidelines (11 September 2025), section 3.4 and the worked examples.
• OpenAI Help Center, ChatGPT search; Perplexity, How does Perplexity work?; Claude Help Center, Enable and use web search.