Too Many on page links! Will "NoFollow" for navigation help?
-
I am getting to many on page links ( for all my pages). Here is my website:
http://www.websterpowerproducts.co.uk
I think it is to do with the the navigation bar down the right hand side. I don't really want to get ride of this as it offers users a way of getting where they want without lots of clicking.
I was wondering if adding a "NoFollow" tag to each of they links would stop the link juice getting diluted by the navigation bar.
Many Thanks
-
From Google's perspective: "If those pages are 'non-important' why are you linking to them from the navigation on every page?"
I didn't see any right-hand navigation, but I did see navigation on the left side. I do not see an issue with it, however, as this is an important way to get people and search engine spiders to category and eventually product pages. Perhaps you are thinking too hard about this so I will throw my opinion in along with the three other experienced SEOs above who all I think agree on this:
Do not nofollow your navigation links. Do not get rid of them. Do not worry about losing "link juice" into those pages.
If you truly think a page is unimportant, such as a category that doesn't sell many products, consider removing it from the navigation. Here's an example of how that might be done in this case:
I see the fly-out navigation to sub-categories includes all sub-categories for each main category. You could choose the top five sub-cats and then include a "See more categories" type of link instead of showing them all. This could be useful on a long list of sub-cats like the one under "Power Tool Accessories". You could limit the navigation to just two categories deep instead of including the third fly-out navigation level (e.g. Power Tool Accessories --> Bit Sets --> Socket Sets).
If the argument is that those third level categories are useful to visitors, thus you want to leave them there, then you have answered your question. Leave them. Don't worry about page-rank. If they are important enough for visitors to want them there and to use them, they are important enough to have their small share of pagerank.
If you choose to ignore all of this advice and want them to be there, but not pass pagerank, you can change the way your navigation operates by using a script so there aren't actually any href tags on the page for the navigation. All of the links would be controlled in the script, which would be placed in an external .js file, which could be inside a folder that is blocked in the robots.txt file. I don't recommend it, but that's one way to do it.
-
I would definitely not use no-follow, that just doesn't make any sense as your navigation links are part of your link juice to those pages.
Also, no-follow is meant for links that are outside a webmasters control or for paid links so they are not intended to be used by a webmaster on his own site linking to his own content.
As for too many links in the navigation (at least that is what I assume you meant), that indeed can be a problem for useability. It is always a good idea to see how well-known brands handle this problem, so have a look at for example http://www.ebay.com/ and http://www.amazon.com/
By not showing all links directly in the navigation you can have both a more user friendly website and get rid of the issue you think you have with search engines as then you can better funnel the link juice to the more important pages.
-
Matt Cutts says: Don't no-follow internal links:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=bVOOB_Q0MZYHe also points out the "issue" of too many links per page is not an issue:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=l6g5hoBYlf0 -
Thank you for your answer.
I am actually trying to stop lnk juice for passing through the navigation bar as I think it is just diluting up the page rank to non-important pages.
-
Unfortunately it won't. Some time ago (like one or two years) Google has announced a change in the way they handle nofollow in combination with link juice. Adding nofollow will only prevent juice from flowing to those pages, but won't distribute it over the other pages like it would when the nofollow'ed links weren't there.
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
-
Sale page ranking for "[blank] for sale" keywords
My company's Ecommerce site has a sale category that is currently out performing some of our normal categories in the SERPs for "[blank] for sale" keywords. For example the sale category landing page is ranking for the keyword "vegetable seeds for sale" rather than the vegetable seed category. Has anyone ever dealt with a similar situation to this? or does anyone have general advice for optimizing (or weakening) sale pages?
On-Page Optimization | | Scoleman1 -
Wrong page ranking on SERP, above more relevant page
Often I will see the wrong page, something less relevant to a particular search, appear higher on the SERP than a more relevant page. Why does this happen and how can it be remedied? I found this Moz article, has anything been written on this topic more recently. Thanks! https://moz.com/blog/wrong-page-ranking-in-the-results-6-common-causes-5-solutions
On-Page Optimization | | NicheSocial0 -
Question about overoptimization and images "alt"
Hello, I own a shop with lots of categories, in each category there is a lot of pictures, some have already alt, must I put the attribute alt in all images, it would be 100% beneficial for my site or could would I be over-optimizing the site? Thank you
On-Page Optimization | | yuyuyu0 -
How about this "onpage overoptimisation" everybody is talking about? Are the on-page optimisation reports still to be used?
Are the on-page optimisation reports still to be used? If we do check all factors we risk penalization because of latest Panda update?
On-Page Optimization | | MugurCosminFrunzetti0 -
Why doe SEOmoz include my categories and subcategories when counting on page links?
Hi everyone, I am new to SEOMOZ, but it looks like really good program. I ran a report last week, and SEOMOZ says that out of 10001 pages, I hve a total of 9995 warnings. When I take a look at the breakdown, it says I have too many on page links. I removed the links from the bottom of each page, but my on page links are still over 100. Does this mean that I will have to get rid of categories and sub-categories in the navigation bar? Thanks, Don
On-Page Optimization | | ge01734000 -
"And" vs "&"
I blog for hotels and I am wondering whether it is best to have on a wordpress tagline the name of the hotel such as Holiday Inn and Suites vs Holiday Inn & Suites. In Google AdWords, the "and" keyword always beats out the "&" word in exact search. The "&" just always looks cleaner. Also, when I refer to the hotel within a blog post, should I use the "and" or "&" in the name? Please help me understand which is best for seo. Thank you!
On-Page Optimization | | lwilkins0 -
Follow up on "Canonical Tag Placement - Every Page?"
But if it is like Pete said, I don't understand why e.g. SEO Moz has a Canonical Tag on this Page http://www.seomoz.org/blog/canonical-url-tag-the-most-important-advancement-in-seo-practices-since-sitemaps Which leads to the exact same page!? What is the benefit of doing so? Regards
On-Page Optimization | | Here4You0 -
Should I include a "|" for better page title SEO results?
I have seen many sites that include the "|" in page titles and was wondering if there is some SEO value in the practice. Example: Product Name | Company Name Instead of: Product Name by Company Name I have not seen any value in it myself other than a good way to avoid stop words. I wanted to make sure. Currently I have the "by" included in the page titles.
On-Page Optimization | | JedHenning0