Follow or Nofollow outbound links to resourceful, related site?
-
As I am going through and redeveloping a website, I am trying to add some external links to resourceful information regarding this page. Should I put a nofollow or follow attribute on these?
I am only putting 1-5 links per page to associations and other organizations that would be beneficial to the visitor. I am worried about the number of outbound links causing me to get penalized.
Ideas?
-
spot on, no-follow does leak link juice, it just that it is not awarded to the linked-to page.
the only use for it is when you dont vouch for the linked-to page.
No-follow for a limited time did not leak link juice, but this made it hard to get links because everyone was trying to hoard link juice, many still believe no-follow does not leak link juice and are still reluctant to give a follow link. -
always follow those links. SEs like to see you linking out to relevant important sites. Also, you never know when one of those sites might take notice.
-
Most of the time.. if its worth linking out to, its worth leaving followed. No-follow really doesnt help you save any juice these days it just tells google you don't trust the site you are linking out to. I would say if you dont trust a site you are linking out to... maybe just don't link to it at all (unless its for a blog post were you are poking fun at the site in question and the link is for reference purposes)
-
Thanks for the reply!
I agree with both points. I think I am just more or less worried that what I am doing would cause search engines to penalize me due to the amount of outbound links from the domain. Maybe I am just thinking to much into it.
I doubt that any of these sites would ever backlink to this specific site, but we can always dream!
-
Thanks for the reply.
Should I actually put the rel="follow" attribute into my <a>tags or leave it off, since default settings should follow that link?</a>
-
Agree with the other two replies - as long as the link goes to a respectible and useful resource, I would leave it as "follow". My reasoning being:
1) People have linked to useful sites since the beginning of the web - It's the more "natural" thing to do. Google tends to like "natural".
2) There's always the chance the site owner will notice the link on my site and link back to me.
-
Personally, I use the "follow" attribute on links to useful resources as it can make a page more relevant if you are linking to authority sites on a particular topic. I can't see why you would be penalized, unless you are linking to off topic spammy sites.
-
When I'm linking out from a page to resourceful information regarding that particular page I always let the link free (without a no follow attribute) so google will follow it and see that the content is somehow valuable for the user. I think if you det the no follow attribute it won't help you as far as SEO, it will only help the user that sees and uses the link.
As for dilution, even if the link is no follow the link juice is still split and counts both do follow and no follow links within that particular page.
Anyway, that's just me.
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
-
Value of Links? What is each link worth?
Morning Everyone, I just had this thought and wondered what everyone's opinions were in terms of link value in monetary terms. We'll assume for the purposes of this that the links come from contextually relevant sites and that the sites in question have got the Moz DA from being high quality and have a good quality incoming link profile. Its a bit of a theoretical question, but i guess imagine if the only way you could get links was to pay for them, what would they be worth to you. This is link value for SEO purposes, they will have in addition value from traffic from good sites, that no doubt varies wildly depending on topic. I assume everyone also agrees on: The first link from a domain is the most valuable High DA sites are worth more than low ones. So could anyone who has an opinion on the link value suggest a monetary value for links. Its really just using a monetary amount to see how best to target my time. Here is my example of what might be expected, but I am hoping people with more knowledge will perhaps correct it. DA Rating First Link 2nd-5th Link 5th-10th Link 10Plus Links 5 $5 $2 $1 $0 15 $7 $3 $2 $1 25 $25 $10 $5 $2 35 $45 $20 $7 $3 45 $65 $30 $11 $4 55 $95 $45 $19 $5 65 $200 $100 $45 $6 75 $350 $120 $65 $9 85 $700 $240 $95 $15 95 $1100 $450 $200 $30
Link Building | | wellandpower1 -
Nofollow links with high spam score
Hi All, Is it worth setting co-operation with website that has incoming links with spam score 96% despite the fact they're mostly nofollow? From my understanding there's still connection set between websites bit no negative impact on my SEO profile. Am I right? Thanks for all opinions.
Link Building | | Optimal_Strategies0 -
Back link from site with DA of 72 to a website domain. Clicking on the link redirects to our website not the attended one.
Hi,
Link Building | | JIMBO16
I've ran a back link check and discovered a good back link to a site which then gets redirected back to my company's website. I have a feeling that an old SEO agency has purchased a small website which has a decent link back from a relevant organisation with a high Domain authority and then redirects the domain to our website to get the link juice. What are your thought on this? Is this really bad practise and possibly damaging? Thanks, Jim0 -
Inbound link is follow link but we put no follow link back - is it beneficial for rankings?
Dear Moz Community, We are operating in a niche market, where there are not so many content marketing options. What we are left with are link exchanging with relevant sites that are on the same topic but to not directly compete with us. Now we know that if we link back to site A and site a links back to us - for google this is not a very good link. But, some of the sites we are exchanging links with, do not know the term follow vs no follow links. My question - if your link is to site A is a no follow link but they give us a follow link - does it mean thats a better option than a follow vs follow. Thanks for help!
Link Building | | advertisingcloud0 -
A link with "return false"- OSE sees as a No Followed Link
Hello, I couldn't find a clear answer to the impact on SEO for a link written in this way: [" class="expert_info" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">](w</span>ww.yourwebsite.com<span style=) [Does the "return false" act as a "no follow"? I came across this in our link data in Open Site Explorer which lists these links all as "no follows." However, an engineer I spoke to said that it shouldn't impact search engine behavior. Any ideas? Thank you in advance! -Sarah K.](w</span>ww.yourwebsite.com<span style=)
Link Building | | OneMedical0 -
Resource linking
Is a resource linking page a good way to build backlinks? Do I need to ask permission of the site I am linking? & If do build a resource page do I have to keep in mind keyword density rule, not to stuff too many links on page? I see one of my competitors using a "resource page" and linking to some high athority sites, (which I know they have not asked permission) b/c they are big name site, NFL, NHL, ESPN etc. Any suggestions much appreciated! Thank you!!!
Link Building | | TP_Marketing0 -
Quick way to extract nofollow sites
Hi all Is there a tool available to quickly detemrine nofollow from follow sites as part of a link building campaign? At the moment I am just referring to the source codes of each identified site Cheers
Link Building | | simonsw0 -
First 100 links for every new site?
Is there a rule of thumb I am unaware of or a place that others start to get links for every new site they create, something like the "first 100 links for every new site" regardless of content? I know you always start building links around what the content of your site is about, but does anyone have a rule of thumb that you always start with links from certain sites regardless of the site content. For example for a local company: Google Places, Bing Local, Linkedin, Facebook, Localeze etc. etc. I just want to make sure I am taking quality first steps for every site I start and was wondering if anyone could give me some good rules of thumb or resources.
Link Building | | photoseo10