If you add a no follow to a time sensitive link, will it get picked up as broken link 404 in WMT report?
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We have a client who publishes deals that are time sensitive.
Links to the deals expire and so Google's crawlers are picking them up and finding a 404
If I no follow them, will the 404's still get picked up and reported in WMT?
The same question applies to SEOMoz Pro.
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Links are still viewed as links whether they are no followed or not. A broken link (404) will still be detected regardless of whether you added the nofollow attribute or not.
Rather then let those links 404, I would suggest an alternative. Have those links go to a specific page on the site designed for expired links. How about a "Oops, that deal is expired. Click <here>to see a list of our current deals" page.</here>
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