Moz Q&A is closed.
After more than 13 years, and tens of thousands of questions, Moz Q&A closed on 12th December 2024. Whilst we’re not completely removing the content - many posts will still be possible to view - we have locked both new posts and new replies. More details here.
Nofollow backlinks - are they worth it?
-
As we all attempt to get backlinks for the sites we manage, I have to wonder if it's worth it at all to get a nofollow backlink. Does Google give and positive credit for a link to a site if it is a nofollow link?
Obviously, the follow links are worth pursuing. I'm just trying to gain some perspective.
Thanks, Wick
-
100% Agree with you. Does not make any sense just add links (do-follow) just to do it. At the end of the day, Google just tries to classify all the info on the web in the best possible way. So if you can contribute to that in any way (Content) that will be reflected in your rank.
-
Great answer from Roman about how no-follow links work, also of note is what the purpose of the link is. On numerous occasions I have opted for a no-follow link on a great blog or page, if I feel it will help add relevant information and thus help users who may be reading the content.
If you feel the no-follow link does not provide value to the article and will not drive additional traffic then it is probably not worth it.
Cheers Tim
-
The rel=nofollow links reign in the land of social media profiles, comments, and publishers
The value of NoFollow links has often led to heated debates among online marketers and SEOs. Ever since Google Penguin has been rolled out, the risk of links has become a central question.
People often claim that links marked as NoFollows have no impact. Some SEOs still rely on former Google statements suggesting that NoFollows do not pass PageRank, taking this as “evidence” that spammy NoFollow links cannot put you at risk of a Penalty.
The true is rel=nofollow links will not improve your ranking, will not pass you DA, so from the Google Index Perspective they are useless. But there are many ways to get the best of those no-follow links.
Getting SEO Value from rel="nofollow" Links
https://moz.com/blog/seo-value-nofollow-linksThe Hidden Power of Nofollow Links
https://moz.com/blog/the-hidden-power-of-nofollow-links
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
-
I want to know about the Impact of Do-follow backlinks and No-follow backlinks for increasing DA.
Have Do-follow backlinks and No-Follow backlinks same value to increase Domain Authority in Moz? Recently, I have created 290 profile backlinks which was do-follow. But from yesterday I have seen all backlinks are no-follow now according to the decision of sites' owners. My site's DA has already increased up to 35. Will this DA fall gradually from now? Apart from it, if I have created same backlinks for my another site; will my DA be 35? Please try to clarify it. My site is: Homeworkpaper.net Thanks. Waiting for your valuable answer.
Link Building | | darrellpc1 -
Is there such a thing as buying white hat backlinks? (example)
Hi, would you guys recommend using a backlink service like this? https://www.peopleperhour.com/hourlie/gain-30-links-from-30-top-newspaper-sites-in-the-uk/396519Or is this the kind of thing that leads to being penalised?Over the years, I've always been told this is black hat and dodgy. Is that always the case?
Link Building | | landport0 -
Are Sidebar Backlinks worth for SEO?
Hello! Let's use the following example: I have a blog (let's call it Blog A) and I find another blog in the same niche (this will be Blog B) that has higher DA and PA than mine. Will Google penalize me if the Blog B puts a link to my blog in their sidebar? Remember, the Blog A and Blog B are from the same niche. I ask this because Google says that links on sidebars appears in every page and in some pages the link may be useless. But if both blogs are from the same niche, there won't be pages where the links will be from different themes and with less relevance. So, is my thought correct: we can use sidebar links without caring about penalization ONLY if the blogs are from the same niche? Thanks in advance!
Link Building | | btqkelvin0 -
A lot of backlinks from outside of niche – bad?
We have received a lot of backlinks over the years by users putting links on their websites to their home pages on our site, eg: our.domain/user1 our.domain/user2 … our.domain/user100000 There are 10’s of thousands of these backlinks, all natural, but many of them come from blogs that are completely outside of our niche. Only a small percentage of our backlinks 1% to 5% could actually be coming from pages related to our niche, the other 95%+ could be users just linking to their home pages. Could this really hurt us..? We have 1000’s of backlinks related to our niche, yet we’ve noticed that some competitors with less than 50 backlinks can outrank us for certain keywords.. Also related, we’ve noticed these user links popping up on a lot of spammy sites, directories, etc. We didn’t create them but we’re disavowing them now to be safe. So this could also be hitting our rankings.
Link Building | | dsumter0 -
Backlinks and PDFs
Hi, we are trying to improve on the number of links to our website. A supplier has added a PDF file which is case study to their website. In the PDF it has a link to our website, will this count as a link or not? Thanks
Link Building | | danieldunn100 -
Do backlinks which contain parameters pass value
For some of our partners, we use our own tracking string in the url i.e. www.mysite.com/landingpage.html?partner=123456 . This has caused backlinks to be created to our site containing the partner string. I was wondering if these links would pass value to www.mysite.com/landingpage.html and the tracking parameters would be ignored or would Google treat www.mysite.com/landingpage.html?partner=123456 as its own page. If it did treat it as a seperate page, could you reclaim some of it using the canoncial tag?
Link Building | | L_F0 -
How to remove backlinks?
Hey guys, With all this anti over optimization movement going around with Google, I decided to do a link building profile audit. I see some pages with PR 0 and some pages that expired. My websites are not penalized at this moment, however I do want to avoid this at all costs. What can I do? Could a backlink from an expired domain penalize my site?
Link Building | | nrv0 -
Does the complete url count as backlink?
Hi there, does the http://mysite.com count as a backlink if posted on a site? I post a press releae and the site only allows me to put urls like this. they get something or must be in anchor the url? Thanks
Link Building | | nyanainc0