Adding NOFOLLOW to all external links, is this a good idea?
-
In the setting of a news site, with articles that often link to one or more outside sources, is it a good idea to rel="nofollow" all external links? Would this hurt link-building prospects?
Of course, internal links would keep on passing link juice back and forth, but is there real harm in following external links?
These would be links our writers and editors created themselves to reputable sources, blogs, etc.
-
Hello,
you said: "From Google's perspective a nofollow link means.... "They paid us!".
I understand this perfectly, but you are not saying that it's against google policy to get paid for banner ads on our website, right?
As long as I have a space dedicated to advertising and I use NOFOLLOW attribute I can sell spaces on my website, right?
Thanks a lot!
-
We have a blog that links out to six to ten external sites every day. All of those links are followed.
Our philosophy for linking out is to only give links to sites that are better than ours or sites that have superior content than ours for a specific subject. So we are not linking out to second class sites.
From Google's perspective a nofollow link means.... "They paid us!"..... or...... "We don't trust this!"..... and neither of those are the case. So why should we use nofollow?
From a pagerank perspective a nofollow has the same impact on internal pagerank flow as a followed link, so it saves you nothing to apply a nofollow. (Google originally blocked pagerank flow through nofollows but then they made it evaporate (a pagerank loss) and didn't tell webmasters. Then Matt Cutts told webmasters that pagerank is lost through nofollow just as it is through a followed link.) So, you don't know how google is treating this because they could have changed their mind again and not told anyone.
Finally, I think of it like this.... The web is the web because it is full of links from one site to another. If you believe that google rewards pages that link out to other great pages then you should be giving followed links. Why? Because if you use nofollow then maybe Google does not give you that reward. I don't know if that is true. Only google knows. But that is where I am placing my bets.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
A website with a spam score of 5 is back linking to me. How important is to get that link removed?
There is a website that OSE has identified with a spam score of 5, it back links to me with a very specific key word. How important is it to have them remove those links?
Link Building | | absoauto0 -
External Followed Links
Hello all, I was wondering if anyone could help me. I have been inputting links for a few months on various different sites but it doesn't seem to be generating links on Open Site Explorer. Does anyone know a reason for this? Thanks in advance, Beth
Link Building | | cmuknbb0 -
Root Domain Link for Affiliate's Link
It seems my affiliate link: http://www.hrmsplugins.com?partners=21 is not being considered as a "root domain" backlink when this link is used on their website. Is there a reason for this?
Link Building | | delphia0 -
Are link exchanges bad for SEO these days? Also, is adding my site to free yet relevent directory sites a bad idea?
I operate a computer services company in Eugene, Oregon called "Eugene Computer Geeks". We do a lot of web design, and need incoming links to my site very badly. Lately I've been asking clients if they would link to me, but they almost always ask for a link in return. If we exchange links, does Google penalize my site? Would the incoming link be better for SEO if I'm not linking back to the other site? ALSO Is it possible that manually submitting my site to free, yet relevant web directories would hurt my rankings? It's not a big deal to me if it doesn't help my rankings, as I see a benefit to having my site listed, but wanted to make sure there wasn't a chance that it would hurt my rankings. As far as I know all the directories are free from SPAM, porn, warez, or anything like that. Thanks!
Link Building | | eugenecomputergeeks0 -
So I ran into a site that was not ranking 4 days ago and has over 2 million links to it on some keywords. My guess is this is a link bomb, but the issue is this is pushing one of my sites down. Does anyone know a good way to over come a bomb like this?
So I ran http://www.riogrande.com/ into this site not that long ago and wanted to see if any other SEO's have an opinion on it. I've seen a Google bomb before, but the amount of links going into this URL is insane. The thing is how does one over come a Google Bomb? Do you just wait to see what Google does or do you just hope to rank under that URL? I should also note that it appears that all the keywords to it are relevant to the sites content. Let me know your thoughts. Thanks
Link Building | | kateG12980 -
Panda Update: Isn't a link still a link?
I was doing some link building and some SEO's said that the Panda update affected many websites. I am going to use eZineArticles.com as my example. EzineArticles was affected by the Panda update and does not show up in the SERPs as much as before. But they still have doFollow Links coming from the articles I am submitting. QUESTION: Regardless if EzineArticles was affected by the Panda Update, isn't a "Follow Link" still a "Follow Link" OR am I completely wasting my time on this devalued website? Edit: Yes I know a PR 0 page is not as valuable as a PR 9 page. I am asking from the standpoint of the affected Panda Update domains overall.
Link Building | | Francisco_Meza0 -
Link building ideas for dentists?
Some ideas to start this discussion: Guestblogging / articles Answerings Q&A's as dentist Starting a blog Any other good link building ideas for dentists?
Link Building | | EdgySEO0