Use Of No-Follow To Control Page Rank Flow

[peter_d]

I wonder about Matt saying:

There’s no stigma to using nofollow, even on your own internal links

http://www.stonetemple.com/blog/?p=187

To my mind, using a lot of no-follow tags on a site is like getting up out of the trench, waving a huge flag with a target on it, and screaming "this site has been aggressively SEOd!"

Very few people have even heard of no-follow. And most of those who have - are SEOs.

[bogs]

i read somewhere that spiders don't like non follow... not really sure about that...

[GuyFromChicago]

Originally Posted by peter_d

To my mind, using a lot of no-follow tags on a site is like getting up out of the trench, waving a huge flag with a target on it, and screaming "this site has been aggressively SEOd!"

Peter, if asked would you say it's a good or bad idea then? I see potential pros and cons but don't know that I would classify heavy/significant use of the nofollow within ones own site as a signal of "aggressive" seo.

[BingoBalls]

Originally Posted by GuyFromChicago

don't know that I would classify heavy/significant use of the nofollow within ones own site as a signal of "aggressive" seo.

I'm in agreement with that. What internal links would you use nofollow to assist with SEO?

The only pages I would consider in using nofollow is the 'useless' pages such as privacy policy and any other that has no use in being indexed. You could call this optimising but is it really going to manipulate the results to better the site rankings?

[Trapped]

I think it is the right moment for Yahoo or MSN to make a major change on their algorithm, I would personally use a different search engine (just if they would give a slightly more accurate results). All this Google Rules is getting on my nose..

[BingoBalls]

Originally Posted by Trapped

All this Google Rules is getting on my nose..

To be honest, it shouldn't. They are trying to better their results with quality rather than the junk that people are trying to get ranked. Personally I believe they should be a lot more aggressive on webmasters who try and manipulate Google results with all sorts of unethical tricks.

I would be more than happy to support any other search engine that could deliver the same numbers in traffic as Google do. With this not being the case I am more than happy to jump through the Google hoops to get the traffic I need to survive.

[mxracer170]

I think he's saying that by placing no follow tags everywhere you're akin to the latest in SEO. I on the other hand have done no SEO to my site, just natural linking, the way google wants it (ya right). Well maybe saying that Google wants no SEO is a bit strong worded. But by placing no follow tags everywhere some people may see that as you admitting you've done something wrong ie raising the flag. SEO? What's SEO? What's a No Follow tag?

[sitetutor]

Originally Posted by peter_d

I wonder about Matt saying:



http://www.stonetemple.com/blog/?p=187

To my mind, using a lot of no-follow tags on a site is like getting up out of the trench, waving a huge flag with a target on it, and screaming "this site has been aggressively SEOd!"

Very few people have even heard of no-follow. And most of those who have - are SEOs.

I personally have never understood how Google advises to build a site as if the search engines didn't exist and on the other hand recommends implementing a no follow attribute to help decide which sites benefit from the links and which ones don't.

[richardvan1]

Well i have started to use No follow tags on my site, however not to excess..

My index page contains duplicate links to the same pages as well as some pages that really hold no value such as an advertising portal page and so on. By placing no follow tags on the duplicate links as well any other links that can be followed from other pages such as my links page I have noticed a huge bump in my SE rankings

So what i have basically done is intead of having around 50 navigation links, i added no follow tags to the ones that can be indexed through other internal pages thus lowering the number of links so around 10 on my index page..

For example rather that having my Links page allow PR flow from my index page i added no follow but it still can be spiderd as there is a link to my sitemap that has a link to the links page which will still allow it to spider and pass PR..

I do agree that people that add no follow to all links can hurt there site but by using certain tactics to control how and where the PR flow goes can benifit ur site.. it has for me anyway

[peter_d]

Good point, SiteTutor

GuyFromChicago - My view is that Google does not like SEO, other than the type of SEO which benefits Google (improving crawlability, adding content).

It's hard to see how controlling the flow of PageRank around a site would benefit Google, other than to raise a clearly identifiable red flag that the sites' owner is making a concerted effort to manipulate rank.

Just my opinion. It would be interesting to see if domains using excessive no follow slip in rank.

[BingoBalls]

Originally Posted by peter_d

My view is that Google does not like SEO, other than the type of SEO which benefits Google (improving crawlability, adding content).

Very true. One of the things I am testing at the moment is how far I can get with being geared more towards crawlability improvement and building content. So far the results are "a lot" better than what I had expected without the need of back links.

[GuyFromChicago]

Originally Posted by peter_d

It would be interesting to see if domains using excessive no follow slip in rank.

I'll let you know - testing this out over the next few weeks on some sites with history. I've run some tests before that I would classify as it moderately successful in terms in increases traffic for the target terms. I've honestly not seen a downside unless mistakes are made. The most common mistake I've seen is lack of research prior to implementation. If you already have a page that ranks well for it's target terms and you start nofollowing internal links that point to that page (especially important ones like home page links for example) there's a strong chance that rank will slip. On the filp side, do things right and there's a strong chance that rank will improve.

My advice is to really do your homework before you go all out with internal nofollows.

In terms of raising an seo flag...it's possible I suppose. I would think sites that use it to control comment spam and the like will tend to utilize it more that those who are trying to use it as method to control link juice.

And just because it makes me feel better we're not using nofollow to manipulate rank we're using it to help Google better understand what parts of our site are important

ps - vbseo does a lot of internal nofollowing of links and I haven't seen any forum owners report any downsides. Just mentioning that because I think that product is used here.

[coolguy27]

Actually nofollow to google control page rank flow and according to google nofollow links have no value whatsoever. But to Yahoo nofollow still follows link....