Follow and NoFollow Links – Should You Care?

Follow and NoFollow Links – Should You Care?

Ever since Google introduced the concept of follow and nofollow attributes to linking, there has been a lot of confusion as to what exactly they are, and what are the best practices considering them. Let’s sort it out a bit.



The nofollow tag was created to prevent spammers from taking over the world. (Or at least your blog comments) So, how’s that working for you, search engines? It was a noble idea, but  ultimately it hurts the real essence of the Web, which is to have relevant links spreading around. Other software solutions, (such as Akismet) can handle a lot of the spam issues, but it seems as if making nofollow a default, (which many of the latest versions of blogging software do) is overkill. A good blog is moderated, and thoughtful, insightful comments should be encouraged and rewarded.



You have some choices to make then, when it comes to how you acquire links and how you tag them on your own blog. Many times a nofollow link from a popular site will bring many visitors. You wouldn’t want to miss out on that! However, getting your share of  incoming links that do pass link juice is obviously preferable. A sane policy would be to shoot for the best and most follow links you can find, and judiciously scrutinize the nofollows. Some may be worth it, others may be spammy, or at best, weak.  It’s why you want to moderate your blogs, so you can not only further the conversation, but also to keep an eye on what’s going on.



It’s a very good idea not to have nofollow on your site internal links. You want the search engines to follow these around your site. You also want each page to link back to the home page. Good places to use the nofollow attribute would be on pages that you don’t care about the page rank, such as your privacy policy, about me page, and term and conditions pages.



While there is a fair amount of debate on whether or not Google follows the nofollow links at all, (Yahoo always has) we feel a link is a link. get as many as you can. If you were to have a link profile  that consisted of nothing but follow, high page rank links, that would be as unnatural as can be. Some count more than others, and  hopefully all will bring a measure of traffic. Just be circumspect about the nofollow links  you collect.

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