Do NoFollow links still split link equity?
-
So I realize that Google will split link equity between all links on any given page. Example, if a landing page has 10 links then the authority from the landing page is split into 10 and each link given its own smaller amount of equity from that landing page. My question is if I were to turn 9 of the 10 links on this page to NoFollow links would the equity still remain split 10 ways or would it simply pass all of it to the one DoFollow link left on the page?
-
Hi Zach,
Good question. In the old days, this was referred to as "PageRank scuplting" - a process where you would place the nofollow tag on your unimportant links in order to pass more value to the links you wanted to count.
Then, in 2009, Google supposedly "plugged" the nofollow hole. Rand and team did a classic Whiteboard Friday on the topic. I still remember watching it the day it came out:
http://www.seomoz.org/blog/whiteboard-friday-how-do-we-plug-the-nofollow-leak
Today, you don't hear much about PageRank sculpting. Most SEOs don't bother with it, partly because of it's decreased effectiveness, but also in part because there are more effective ways of controlling the influence of links.
This is where the issue becomes more complex. Link "equity" or PageRank, (or MozRank), is only one small factor in the overall value of a link. Anchor text, position on the page, and a host of other factors all influence how much influence any given link can wield. Here's a good introduction on the subject (again from Rand)
Hope this helps! Best of luck with your SEO.
-
As I understand it, the link equity is still spent evenly to all 10 links even if 9 of them are nofollow.
The 1 dofollow will receive its share, while the 9 nofollow will be sent it, but they won't receive the credit.
-
If you were to convert 9 of the 10 total links on the page into a nofollow, the only dofollow link will get all the link juice. I hope that clearly answers your question.
Edit: It looks like this changed a while ago (mid 2009) that if nofollow is added to 9 of the 10 links, the 10 links only get 10% of the link juice instead of the 100% and the 90% essentially gets lost.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
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
-
How can I check spam score and non indexed links
Hi I am working on a project in which I have a local services website <a target="_self">www.thepcrrg.com</a> I want to be sure its links are getting indexed or not. Please help me.
On-Page Optimization | | Jioiebytt2 -
Internal Website Linking from Syndicated Blog Posts
Does it help, hurt, or do nothing for my website's SEO if I do internal linking from syndicated blog posts (on my blog) to my website pages? For example, a syndicated blog post on winterizing your house has instances of "homeowners insurance" linking to my webpage on homeowners insurance. Proper canonicalization is done as well.
On-Page Optimization | | BFMichael0 -
How do you increase the page footprint, so more links appear on search result?
We want to have more website links to appear in SERP. How to do that?
On-Page Optimization | | WalterHalicki0 -
Can any one give some advise on how to work out which back links are bad
we are trying to clean up our site and believe we have bad back links can any one tell me how to work out which ones to disavow
On-Page Optimization | | CostumeD0 -
Noindex, nofollow tags
Hi, I have changed my tags to noindex,nofollow with Yoast. But still, seomoz software showing me warnings and errors for those pages. Also did the same for archive pages example.com/page-2/ and facing the same problems. I need to clear as much errors as I can in the software so I can see the real remaining errors in the website. Help will be highly appreciated. Thanks.
On-Page Optimization | | Xasir0 -
What is everyone doing to reduce the number of links on a page?
Some clients of mine have sites that are throwing the "too many links on one page" error and we're not just talking a little more than the status quo 100 links, it's much more. I believe it could be due to the fly-out navigation. My Solution: shorten the Tier 2 categories in the left nav down to 5 and add a "View All" link after the 5th and remove top nav fly-outs. I'm not sure if these are best practices or the best for usability though?
On-Page Optimization | | LisaS130 -
A "show all" category for products resulting in to many on-page links
I've got reports from my seomoz pro campaign that I have more than 100 on-page links on a page of my ecommerce store. This page is a "show all" category displaying ALL products from ALL my categories on the site. So it is NOT a "show all" for displaying all products in a certain category on one page instead of having to click through page 1, page 2 etc. What I don't clearly understand is why I get this from the reports, as it does not display all products in one single page. What it does is gathering all products from all categories in one place, but instead of showing all products in one page it is divided into pages 1 - 13. What should I do to resolve this? Could it be the seomoz campaign giving me an incorrect result? Appreciate you taking the time to help! Thank you.
On-Page Optimization | | danielpett0 -
More than 100 internal links from a page
Hi, we have been developing our new site and improving the internal linking for 2 reasons, 1 to improve spidering and 2 to up sell more to customers. The error reports from SEOMoz are showing our biggest problem is too many internal links from 2000+ pages. How much of an impact does it have by having say 180 internal links compared to say 99 on a page? Our website has been moving up the SERPs so should i worry about it or should I ignore the warnings and continue with the menu system and internal linking we have in place already? Thanks
On-Page Optimization | | PottyScotty0