In a nutshell, the “nofollow” attribute was developed by Google as a way for website owners to ensure that search engine spiders do not follow certain links on their website. The attribute has become commonplace as of late, with MSN and Yahoo also respecting the its purpose. For example, the Google spider comes across a site where the following code appears:

<a href=”www.example.com” rel=”nofollow”>Example Site</a>

The spider will see that this link is not to be followed and will not scan the linked page nor add that backlink ‘s value to the target site’s PR. This method can be quite useful in preventing spam on sites, with such big names as Wikipedia and Youtube implementing the tag to prevent PR flowing from their sites to spammers. If you would like to know a little bit more about the development and use of this attribute check out the Wikipedia article. For now let’s see how this affects our site.

Nofollow and How Not to Get Scammed

As with any useful technology there will always be those that use it for nefarious purposes. While nofollow is a useful tool in controlling search engine behavior, it can also be used against you. Suppose site “A” agrees with site “B” to exchange reciprocal links. Site “A” is an honest site and posts a legitimate link to “B.” Although “B” is now obligated to give a link in return, the site is run by dastardly SEO experts that want to find a way out of this. They in turn post a link to site “A” that appears normal, but a quick peek at the source code reveals otherwise. What they have actually done is posted a link with the “nofollow” attribute that the search engines will not follow. To the search engines it will appear that “A” has given a one way link to “B” since they can’t see that the link is actually reciprocal. This will boost the rank of “B” to the detriment of “A.”

Although this problem doesn’t seem to be terribly rampant, it is certainly worth keeping in mind when you are dealing with a site that doesn’t seem to be on the up and up. Because the search engine won’t visit the linked site, you won’t receive any of the PR value that you thought you were getting from a link exchange and your search position will suffer. Luckily there are numerous tools available to check for this sort of thing, with my personal choice being SEO Pro.

Using Nofollow for Yourself

Now that we’ve covered some of the nastier aspects of nofollow, let’s focus on ways that we can use the attribute to benefit our search position. The best way to use nofollow is to control how a search engine views your own page. Because PR is a conserved resource we would like to see as much of it stay on the pages that we want to promote. Let’s say that the front page of our site is a PR 4 with three subpages: a contacts page, an “about” section and a section for our articles. Because the links to our contact information and about page aren’t going to be getting many results from search engines, let’s go ahead and cut them off using nofollow. By placing this attribute in the link tags for these two pages we have reduced the number of pages that our front page links to. Instead of spreading that PR juice among three links we have now reduced it to one. In doing this we’ve channeled our linking power to the page (the articles) that we want to promote.

This ability can be applied across your site in numerous ways. If you have old posts that you’re not focusing on marketing anymore it may be wise to consider applying “nofollow” on your links to those pages to prevent your link credibility from getting spread too thin. This isn’t recognized as an official purpose of the attribute, but even the inventors have promoted the use of it in this manner.

Quick Recap

Hopefully I’ve filled you in on all the dangers (and benefits) the “nofollow” attribute can create for you. It has been suggested by some that the search engines do in fact follow these links but that they are not factored into ranking, still leaving some benefit to a link weighed down with “nofollow.” Other search engines, such as Ask.com, do not respect the attribute at all, so links will help regardless of whether “nofollow” is present or not. Spam has shown little sign of slowing down in the face of the attribute, with spammers still planting links for the sake of putting information in front of more eyes. Whatever the case may be, it is useful to understand how “nofollow” works in regulating your backlinks as well as links within your site.