Follow vs No Follow - is there a consensus?

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Hi,

As a newbie, I'm been soaking up all the great knowledge here by a boatload. One question that I have is this: What is the final verdict on follow vs no follow backlinks (if one exists)?

I understand the general advice - go for plenty of follow backlinks, since those are the ones google cares about and actually counts as a backlink, bumping your google rank.

Yet, there are experts here that say - follow/no follow doesn't matter, simply go for links with highest quality (high PR). The logic behind it is two fold:

1. Yahoo and bing don't care about follow/no follow status and count everything as backlinks.
2. For a site to have only follow backlinks is very suspicious, so Google might actually ding you for having only "follow" backlinks to your site.

Can you weight in on this discussion? What should we focus on? What gives us the bigger boost in the ranking?

High quality links with no regard to follow/no follow rules, or just a boatload of follow links (with perhaps lower quality PR)?

Thanks
#search engine optimization #consensus #follow
  • Do-follow increase your link power and PR in long run, however a no-follow from a high traffic page increases the chances of visitors clicking your link resulting in increased conversions (it depends if they convert).
    I like it short & precise
    Best Regards,
    -S
  • I prefer to get both types, not really because it looks 'natural' as everyone preaches, but more because I'm of the mind that nofollow links are not completely worthless. Many, however, think they are worthless, and to that I say "More links for me..."
  • Boatload of "follow" links > high quality links that contain a lot of nofollow.

    The "experts" claiming that you shouldn't worry about do/nofollow just keep spreading this misinformation so they get easier rankings and the rest of the herd just follows and re-iterates what they've read instead of just testing it themselves. Sounds like a conspiracy but I've seen this happen over and over again. Neither does a nofollow link pass any PR or ranking value, nor does it help with passing anchor text. It can be great though to get traffic/human visitors.

    Yes, Yahoo and Bing might think differently about nofollow but are you trying to rank there or in Google? Probably the latter, since it holds the vast majority of traffic. Of course it would be stupid to ignore Y/B but still, you'll be focusing the bulk of your efforts on getting to rank in G.

    It's debatable if a mix of do/nofollow makes your link profile look more "natural" and this debate will probably never end so without taking sides I'll just say what works for me and my clients: Concentrating on "dofollow" as much as possible.
    • [1] reply
    • Nofollow links don't pass "ranking value"? Lol, now that's a first.
      • [1] reply
  • Use both NoFollow and DoFollow so your link looks natural to the Big G. But there is no harm in doing more DoFollow links than NoFollow links.
  • There is no consensus, nor will there ever be. Test for yourself and draw your own conclusions, then act accordingly.
    • [1] reply
  • Banned
    I have wikipedia nofollow backlinks that kick a$$!

    As far as seo, I wouldn't trade my free wiki links for anything!
    • [1] reply
    • Sorry Yukon same goes for you too. prove it. you have the burden of proof. What I will say is that getting links on wikipedia will give you a higher awareness and others will link to you because they perceive you as an authority site.
  • Get both. I still have not come across a bad backlink.
  • If a link is no follow then Google bots will not follow it, a program is a program it does what the algorithm says, nothing more and nothing less, and you will not get any benefit from that link in terms of ranking.

    But if that link is in a high traffic site then you might get visitors from it.

    So it's true, there are no bad backlinks.
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