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 to block index of link and content
Hi, We have pages where articles are shown and in the sides we have small snippets of Articles which shows the title and close to 25 words and a image. When i search for something in Google the snippet image and content is shown and in Google when clicked it redirects to a page which is not meant to be shown for the keyword the visitor is querying Is there a way i can block all the links and content shown in the right and left side of the page so Google does not get confused with the page content thats not related to that page? thanks
On-Page Optimization | | AlexisWithers0 -
Total Links has doubled in less than one month!? Trust and Authority Drop
Hey Guys, Our website has just recently started to manage our website with SEO in mind and there are a few things that I am concerned about. 1. Domain authority, moztrust, mozrank have been dropping. 2. We had 368k links on 6/27 and on 7/11 we had 563k Is this a result of confusion between our www.websitenamehere.com and websitenamehere.com?
On-Page Optimization | | briggsb0 -
Navigation Links Causing Too Many Links Help?
Hello, I have read some SEOMOZ search results for this, but am still concerned that Google may see 4,500 Too Many Link warnings as a problem. This is caused primarily due to our header navigation, which is not intended to be keyword stuffing, but to provide all avenues for our breadth of content. site: crazymikesapps.com. Most answers seem to advise if there is no keyword stuffing at hand don't worry about it. Any help appreciated. thank you Mike
On-Page Optimization | | crazymikesapps0 -
Too many on page links - created by filters
I have an ecommerce site and SEOmoz "Crawl Diagnostics Summary" points out that I have too many hyperlinks on most of my pages. The most recent thing I've done that could the culprit is the creation of number product filters. Each filter I put on the page is creating a hyperlink off that page. As an example, there's a filter available for manufacturers. Under that, there are 8 new filter links, thus new hyperlinks. On one category there are 60 new links created because of filters. I feel like these filters have made the user experience on the site better BUT has dramatically increased the number of outbound links off the page. I know keeping it to under 100 is a rule-of-thumb but at the same time there must be some validity to trying to limit them. Do you have any recommendation on how I can "have my cake and eat it too?" Thanks for any help!
On-Page Optimization | | jake3720 -
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 -
Are My footer links bad?
I started working here recently, they said the footer links were to help with navigation of their most popular products. I am curious after reading http://www.seomoz.org/blog/internal-linking-strategies-for-2012-and-beyond if having these footer links could hurt the ranking of those key words after the penguin update. I am looking more into the analytics, and have not seen a negative impact yet.
On-Page Optimization | | DoRM0 -
Internal linking structure
howdy SEO moz people, I had a quick question about internal linking. I am using the WP platform for my website and on one of the widgets I have a category widget that shows all the pages, (on every page). I wanted to know that when if i make a new post or page does it matter if the internal anchor texts are on the content itself or is it suffice to have it on the side bar within the widget? Basically what im asking is does it matter if i have anchor text links on the content itself or is it ok to have it anywhere on the page. and if it does matter to have it on the content, please help out on any suggestions on where to place them. thanks
On-Page Optimization | | david3050 -
Too many links on page has a state directory how do i lessen this?
I dont mean how do i take away links on the page but i know right off i am going to have at least 50 right off the bat and with my footer and menu bar and such im up over the limit of 100. My seo guy took care of it on my one site and dont know how Site with issue is www.Preexistingconditioninsuranceplan.com/pcip-states one that was fixed that doesnt appear to be too many on seomoz was http://criticalillnesspolicies.com/insurance-coverage/united-states/ if anyone can inform or decypher the code please let me know
On-Page Optimization | | lance010