There are various benefits of having sitemap footer like:

• Allows more clicks and visits:  A visitor might not go through all the information on the site but footer contents attracts the user. Sitemap placed in the footer will pull more visitors and increase page views and clicks.
• Ensures that visitors are not missing out on anything:  Placing of a sitemap in the footer provides it with more exposure. Even the visitors, who are lazy to click and go to other pages, have a look at the sitemap. Thus the visitor will have an overview of all the pages.
• Footer to promote other links:  Footer can be alternatively used to promote various links and other pages.
• Readers’ time is saved:  Positioning of sitemap in the footer lets the visitors to speedily navigate from one page to another. It saves on a lot of time of the readers.
• Visitor’s click is saved: Sitemap in the footer instead on a separate page, save a click of the visitors.
• Augment layout design: If you don’t have any content to be added to the footer, sitemap helps fill up the space. This helps increase the size of the site and enhances its layout design.

Almost all the leading sites like Mozilla Firefox, Apple, White House, Square Space, etc. have placed sitemaps in the footer, which has helped their visitors to easily search through their site. The many benefits of placing the sitemap in the footer have made it an essential tool of every website.