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One of the many factors that SEOers should not ignore when building a “quality” website is the construction of do-follow and no-follow links. Links help improve your rankings and drive more traffic to your website.
Based on nature, links are divided into two categories: do-follow and no-follow links. These are two factors that SEOers should not take lightly. So:
- What is a do-follow link?
- What is a no-follow link?
- What are they used for?
- How does it affect your website’s ranking?
In this article, we will give you all the information you need to know about do-follow and no-follow links to improve your website’s ranking.
The concept of do-follow and no-follow links
In addition to the series of SEO criteria to be optimized, it is essential for SEOs to pay attention to the link of the web. Just like people are rated through their relationships. Website is evaluated similarly through internal links and backlinks, collectively referred to as links.
Google evaluates websites by releasing bugs (Google bots) for them to crawl. Links on the web or pointing to the web are meant to be a bridge to help Google navigate to perform their tasks.
However, not all “bridges” allow Google bots to pass through. We distinguish the links that the bot can go through and not go through are do-follow and no-follow.
In the HTML language, the rel-tag helps to identify the nature of the links. To better understand do follow and no follow links, let’s learn about rel tags in HTML.
What does the rel-tag mean?
In HTML, the rel-tag is an attribute type used to specify the nature of the link. The rel-tag is a product of Google. The spider will rely on the rel-tag to determine its path.
We often see rel tags as:
- Rel = “nofollow”
- Rel = “dofollow”
- Rel = “canonical”
In the context of this article, we talk more about the do-follow and no-follow properties of links.
What is a do-follow link?
The do-follow link, also known as the rel = “do follow” tag, is considered a hyperlink. It has the function of passing and indexing Google bots.
With do-follow links, Google understands that this is a reputable and safe link. As a result, your website will receive a Google rating and increase Pagerank points (although PageRank is no longer recognized, practices still have some influence).
The do-follow link can only help increase the PageRank of the website provided the linked site has the quality and good content. On the contrary, your website will be undervalued and Pagerank down when:
- The content of the linked web is not relevant to your niche.
- Affiliate website has bad content, low reputation.
To overcome this drawback, we have a new concept of no-follow links.
What is a no-follow link?
The exact opposite is true of do-follow links. Nofollow links are also a Google product but do not allow bugs to pass through. It is a sign that search engines will ignore the link by default.
The no-follow link is used by webmasters to prevent bad actors from poor backlinks through the rel = “no-follow” tag. Since the bots cannot pass through, the no-follow link is not awarded Pagerank points. Web rankings are not affected by these links.
In link juice generation techniques, the no-follow link has no value. Conversely, using too many no-follow links dilutes resources and leaks links.
Usually, no-follow links are:
- Blog comments.
- Social networks (Articles with links).
- Forum posts, user-generated content.
- Some blogs and websites are not verified.
- Links from widgets.
- Links from press releases.
- Sponsored content.
The SEO value of do-follow and no-follow links
In terms of appearance, both are attached to the anchor text. Users will not distinguish which is a do-follow link, which is a no-follow link. In other words, these two types of links do not affect the user experience.
In terms of SEO value, these two types of links have completely different meanings. Both have value and effect separately for the website. Depending on the action of placing links in the article or building backlinks, do-follow and no-follow links all play an important role for websites that need SEO.
For putting links on the website
In theory, no-follow links are not beneficial for website SEO. But you should still no-follow links for your web links in some cases like:
- Generate traffic through another website.
- Links to unverified content.
- Avoid spam in comments.
When you want to validate the authority of your website with search engines and users. Use the do-follow link. In order not to be PageRank deducted, select the content related to your articles to increase the linkability of the two websites.
In this way, you can exchange links with reputable articles in the field of business.
As for the backlink
The confirmed links are a factor for the search engines to rank the website. Black hat SEOs are crazy about backlink spam. Nofollow links were created to combat this form of spam.
As mentioned above, users cannot distinguish between do-follow and no-follow links. The use of no-follow links is also a way to pull some traffic back to the website.
Finally, even though the bots do not go through the no-follow links, Google still indexes this content. This can still impact search engine attribution with the web’s link power profile.
Because of the influence on PageRank, when choosing a backlink as a do-follow link, the content and authority of the website have been tested. Having a do-follow link will create a backlink with high off-page SEO value. This contributes greatly to building link juice for your website.
Whether indirect or direct, do-follow and no-follow links both have an impact on website rankings. When optimizing off-page SEO criteria, you should consider placing links and building links for the best fit.
How to check the do-follow and no-follow links on the website
To check whether the link you are using is a do-follow or no-follow link is very simple. Here are two test methods that we would like to recommend.
1 / Manual method
The manual method is how you check the link’s properties for yourself, regardless of the supporting software.
Step 1: View page source
To view the page source, you can do it in two ways:
- Right-click and select “View source”.
- Add text view-source: in front of the URL of the web page.
Example: view-source: https: //nef.vn/dofollow-va-nofollow-link/
Step 2: Check link properties.
Once you have access to the source of the page, you use Ctrl + F to find no-follow and do-follow with keywords: no-follow, follow.
You can also check all no-follow or do-follow-linked anchor text by ctrl + F with the keyword: ahref.
The rel-tag, which declares the link’s nature, is usually placed after or immediately after the link is attached. Thanks to this identification, you can easily determine the properties of the link.
This is a simple method, no need to depend on the supporting software. However, this method is inconvenient and very laborious. Sometimes it is difficult to see because there are many lines of code.
To overcome this disadvantage, you can use applications that allow you to quickly determine link properties.
2 / Use support tools.
Each browser has its own characteristics, so the application supports different no-follow and do-follow link checking.
- Firefox browser: SEO Quake, Nodofollow
- Chrome browser: NofollowSimple
- WordPress blog: Meta Robots plugin
With wordpress, you can also install a number of plugins to optimize the website and the links placed on the page.
How to set the optimal do-follow and no-follow link
Once you understand the effects and meaning of no-follow and do-follow links, you should consider placing links on blogs. You absolutely can interfere with the nature of the link in your blog post.
The content displayed to the user is SEO Nef Digital. In the HTML language, this piece of content has the following format:
<a href=”https://nef.vn/dich-vu-seo/”> SEO Nef Digital </a>
To specify the no-follow or do-follow attribute for a link, you just need to put the rel-tag after the link. The rel = “no-follow” or rel = “follow” tag will tell Bots the nature of the link.
For example, if you want to specify the nature of the link as nofollow, add the rel = “nofollow” tag as follows:
<a href=”https://nef.vn/dich-vu-seo/” rel=”nofollow”> SEO Nef Digital </a>
When writing in WordPress, you enter HTML (text) edit mode to perform the above operations.
How many links to put in the blog
Based on 45 criteria of SEO standard articles built by Nef Digital. You should put 2 – 5 internal links in your posts. Internal links should be followed in order for search engines to evaluate the topic of the website.
For outbound links (outbound links) you should also give some evidence to increase the relevance of the article content. If possible, do-follow for websites with a high DA rating.
Optimal backlink rate
So far, there is still a no-follow link and the do-follow link is “best”. Some people think 50/50 is reasonable, but there are opinions like 40/60 or 30/70.
On an Alexa survey, the ratio of the no-follow and do-follow backlinks of the most successful websites was approximately 25/75. This shows that a higher rate of backlinks affects the website’s ranking. Thanks to this amount of do-follow backlinks, the authority of the web are appreciated.
Above is the article to share knowledge about do-follow and no-follow links. The Nef Digital team hopes to provide you with some useful information. Any feedback or suggestions, please comment below the article or contact Nef Digital.