Linking to category pages within posts - Is it important?

[pokeraussie]

This is not something I have given much thought of tbh. In addition to the main navigation, do you link to category pages within posts? I am wondering if this is important even when you're not necessarily trying to rank category pages (more curious about the effect it can have on other internal pages)

[parttimepoker]

I generally do as part of a breadcrumb or footer - I think it's good for users / increases site stickiness a small bit.

[Michael Martinez]

I do it occasionally but I want my category pages to be found, indexed, and shown by the search engines. If you don't want them to appear in search listings it's kind of a waste of good PageRank-like value and crawl (but may still be user-friendly).

I think you should do whatever you feel works best for your users.