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.
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
-
Effects of a bad link linking to a image
i am getting a lot of links from wallpapers sites.. One person has created 1000's of similar sites that are linking back to my images. My guess is images do not pass link value positive or negative. But I am not sure what the potential effects would be. Does anyone know who linking to images might effect SEO especially when there coming from horribly low quality auto generated sites.
Link Building | | KentH0 -
Nofollow links showing up in Google Search Console
If some nofollow links are showing up in Google Search Console, does that mean they are indeed passing link juice?
Link Building | | BrightonRecoveryCenter0 -
How many links per week/month should a link building campaign acquire?
I am running a linkbuilding campaign for my company. I am mostly focusing on guest blogging opportunities and responding to emails from HARO. How many links would I have to acquire each week or month to be considered doing a good job over a 6 month or a year time period? Thank you,
Link Building | | fersu0 -
Links from Real Estate Websites Link Page, Do or Don't?
It seems that real estate sites have at times been under heavier scrutiny from the search engines. But real estate agents get networking, which makes acquiring those links a little bit easier. Plus with localization of search, I think real estate sites may give off a good GEO scent. Should SEO's go for links from real estate websites? Does a reciprocal link devalue said links?
Link Building | | Thos0030 -
There is a New link to my Site but I can see it on link report ?why ?
Hi I found out using link campaign and Open site explorer that my competitors where getting links from this page http://www.visitgreece.gr/en/activities/land_sports/golf So I conatc the admins and added our golf courses too Is the dunes and the bay course in the middle of the page But this happened 3 weeks ago and still this linking domain is not appaering in my campaign why is that any ideas ? does it take so much time to appera to SEOmoz ? Or the problem is because they are linking 2 diffrent sites ? my site is www.costanavarinogolf.com Thanks a lot in advance for your help
Link Building | | grzontan0 -
Page links vs. domain links
Hello all, I am trying to find out how Google weighs page inbound links vs. domain inbound links. I have a domain with about 100,000 inbound links and am adding a new page to my domain which at this time has 0 links. I will be trying to outrank a competitors page that has 6,000 inbound links to the competitors page, but only has 26,000 inbound links to my competitors domain . Is there a formula or a way to know how Google values a page link vs. a domain link?
Link Building | | digitalops0 -
Any good link building companies out there
Hi Guys, Does anyone know or can recommend any really good link building companies out there? There are lots and lots of link building companies but which ones can really do the job! Any recommendations much appreciated Thanks
Link Building | | GAZ09
Gareth0 -
Building Links
Hi everyone, I am new to SEO and in the process of building links the clean way. Any suggestions on how exactly I can find websites that are linking out to quality websites already? I went thru most of my competitors link building strategy - and 90% of their links are done either thru link exchange or paid links. So looking at my competitors strategy does not really help. So I need to find websites/blogs/forums that are ready to link to me if I can show them some useful content. How do I find these websites first? Please help! Cheers! Arjun
Link Building | | ArjunRajkumar0