No-Follow SEO Debate
There is a heated debate going on right now that focuses on the implementation of the “nofollow” attribute for paid links. Matt Cutts offers his Google opinion on the subject:
Clear disclosure of sponsorship is critical, and that includes disclosure for search engines. If link in a paid post would affect search engines, that link should not pass PageRank (e.g. by using the nofollow attribute). Google — and other search engines — do take action which can include demoting sites that sell links that pass PageRank, for example.
Cutts singles out the recent KMart campaign. To be fair, Ted Murphy (creator of the KMart campaign) also has a response on the subject of sponsored conversations.
Each of these men can issue response after response – but until Google is 100% clear on its policies and its algorithms, webmasters are going to be hard to convince that nofollow is the way to go.
I see many problems with Google’s stance on the nofollow attribute, none of which are different than what has already been stated. Until Google comes up with a way to differentiate between what is paid and what is organic, penalizing every site for “potential” paid links is ludicrous. The same goes for penalizing a site with a clearly disclosed advertising post, just because the link is a dofollow. It seems that Google is in control of the Internet and if you do not play by their rules, you will be penalized.
On a similar note, there is a poll at SEO Roundtable that asks if URL shortening services should pass link value. While I haven’t seen or heard anything from Google on this, I am sure their stance is “No.” Be sure to cast your vote.
Regardless of what happens with this debate, we are going to see more and more sites adopt the nofollow attribute unless otherwise noted by Google – Craigslist being the most recent.
~Crystal
on March 5th, 2009 at 9:18 am
This whole “no-follow” paradigm is certainly changing link building strategies across the web. I agree with you that penalizing sites for “potential” paid links is ludicrous, as I am sure many sites have been wrongly accused and penalized for such links.
I am interested to see what they decide to do with the tiny URL (I voted “Yes” along with 75% of other people)!
on March 5th, 2009 at 9:32 am
I have a real problem with Google trying to police the internet lately. They’re not the only search engine, yet they enforce their guidelines to “benefit” the online community. They are only thinking of themselves and the money they’re missing out on. Why demote certain sites that pass PageRank from paid services? This is just like any other form of advertisement, a company paying for reach and frequency. Is this much different than Google Adwords, Adsense, and their other revenue generating services? We all want to please Google, but it’s not right for them to threaten everyone when they can’t always tell a paid link from an organic one.
on March 6th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
Even though I’m new at this I can totally see how this will not be beneficial for LST and what we do but at the same time they are a corporation that have slowly managed to become the #1 search engine worldwide by doing minimum promotion and being the quiet kid in the back of the class, and now that they have achieved what they have can we really blame them for taking advantage of what we all have put in their hands? If you think about it no one owns the internet, so its just a matter of time until someone with enough power took charge and began to take advantage of the most powerful resource mankind has created…
on March 6th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
@Forrest – Completely agreed. The frustrating thing is that until we have a firm grasp on what Google decides to do (meaning never), we are almost at a loss. It is definitely going to change the way SEO’s work.
@Phil, It is the same as advertising, in my opinion as well. The web is all about reaching your community and with social growing at such a rapid pace, pretty soon PR and SERPs are going to take a backseat. What will matter is content being delivered to RSS feeders and social interaction. The way we define “advertising” is already starting to change. It is going to be interesting to see the web change over the next few years.
@Nelson, I do understand that they make great products and have positioned themselves as a company with a lot to offer. However, I think with all of that power comes a lot of responsibility to your users. Right now, Google is not being completely upfront with consumers about the way they do business and in the end, it will come back to bite them. How can they expect us to live by their code when 1) they don’t make it explicit and 2) they don’t live by it themselves.
on March 10th, 2009 at 5:41 pm
I gotta take Google’s side in this. it’s their website/search engine and they can do whatever they want. they are only accountable to the searchers and their shareholders.