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OK I have been debating this on some other threads recently. Since WPN Video now has a video on the subject I thought I would post something in WPW:
» SMX West 2008: Stephan Spencer WebProNews Videos: Videos from WebProNews.com It is a simple question. Does PR Sculpting work or not. If so do you have proof of it. Sure conceptually it seems like it would, but I am wondering about those that have tested it out and can prove that it does work. Remember I looking for proof of it working alone, not simultaneously with other changes. I have never been a big believer in the concept of PR hoarding. I really don’t believe that adding the nofollow attribute can greatly help you r internal OBLs on the page. The biggest argument against this is that millions of websites rank and will always rank without having to worry about implementing the nofollow attribute, thus why would Google allow this simple trick to give our websites the “golden ticket” of ranking higher by implementing it. I believe they don’t. I am also tired of doing things because it is the hot new thing right now and believe some solid data on using the nofollow should be expressed somewhere. Not simply saying “hey Cutt’s said it should work so we should do it” as was recently heard at SMX. More on this at Sphinn as well and a more believable thread from one of my favorites Michael Martinez: SEO Nonsense - Sculpting PageRank Builds Muscle - SEO Theory - SEO Theory and Analysis Blog Last edited by mike; 03-07-2008 at 09:35 AM. |
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Another post on one believes this PR Sculpting would work:
No Follow Tag | Internal Use of No Follow Tag |
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If Cutts says it's a viable concept (and he has) and somebody Like Stephen Spencer says he's used it, tested it, and found a benefit (and he has)... That's pretty much all I need.
Excerpt from a Rand Fishkin Q&A where this topic is discussed: Quote:
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Nobody's saying you have to use it... nobody's saying you have to necessarily agree with it. But it is a concept that many professionals in this field - who I feel are very knowledgeable and authoritative - have more or less signed off on. Like most any other SEO tactic, some people will use it, some won't. There are so many pieces of the puzzle in SEO that hardly any one single tactic, tip, or trick is going to make or break any SEO campaign. Back in school, I'd say you were disputing the concept on the basis that an appeal to authority argument is one of the classic fallacies. ie: Bob says blue widgets are great. Bob is a superhero rockstar that everybody loves. Blue widgets must be great. Appeal to authority fallacy ( I liked logic class). However... authority is generally just dandy for propositional and procedural concepts (like SEO for the most part). If Michael Jordan says: "This is the best way to shoot a free throw" I am thinking, I can probably trust that shooting free throws like that is generally a pretty good idea.
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WebProNews Videos Last edited by mike; 03-07-2008 at 10:11 AM. |
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Michael because people use it does that prove it works??
First off on the topic of Matt and Rand's conversation I will simple quote Michael Martinez comments as he says it better than I ever could on that Q and A thread: Quote:
We need to stop jumping on the bandwagon of SEO techniques so quickly without properly testing this stuff out. Just because conceptually something seems like this should work doesn't mean that it does. I am asking a simple question. Is this a stand alone technique that can benefit your website? I really have yet to see proof of it, rather just speak of how cool of tool it is. |
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I agree Dave and I am in now say saying that using the nofollow is a bad thing. Like Mike said to each his own and you can choose to use it or not. I just wanted to start this discussions on to go over the so-called benefits of the no follow. Mike has pointed out lots of industry experts have said hey this is a good thing. We should use it. Just would like to see more in-action proof of its value that is all.
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I just want to touch on something Mike quoted...
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I'm certainly not questioning the results, merely asking what if? Dave |
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I have tested it on my blog and have seen little value in doing so. |
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I am about to do some testing of my own on another site I am working on. I will let you know what my results are when it has had time to propagate.
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Additionally, Stephen indicates is his reply to Shari in the quote, that their testing showed that it "worked". Worked at doing what? Sculpting PR? Improving rankings or visibility? Was there any detrimental effect with regards to any other SE's? What was the net result? If a gain in PR by sculpting it results in net loss in the grand scheme of things, what has been accomplished? Dave |
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Yeah, other search engines are obviously a consideration but IMO it seems that they either have the same stance as Google or totally ignore it so I don't think it would have a negative effect. I will try to report my findings back about something I am working on when it has to time to have an effect (whether it does or not).
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Another big issue is that the SEO community are basically the only people that know about nofollow. Are we to believe Google has gifted only the people who know of nofollow attribute the ability to out-rank others that dont use it? LOL, hardly. In fact even if this PR Sculpting does work, it probably does on such a small level comparable to other SEO techniques it is not even worth doing at all. |
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Since I'm a big Michael Jordan fan...
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Dave Last edited by crankydave; 03-07-2008 at 01:25 PM. |
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Ah... then maybe it isn't the concept that is flawed but the execution, no?
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WebProNews Videos |
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Done correctly, I don't see a problem with applying the nofollow attribute to internal links.
Suppose I've got a product page with three links all pointing to the same url. One, a text link consisting of a product name or number, another link applied to a product image with a fairly good alt attribute and one consisting of a "view more info" text link. Most would probably agree that, from an SEO standpoint, the single best link would probably be the one consisting of a product name or number. That being the case, why not reserve the most link juice for the single best link instead of allowing it to seep out through a generic "view more" text link or a generic image with an alt attribute? While the positive effects might indeed be negligible and therefore difficult to measure, I'm inclined to agree that it's certainly not going to hurt. Of course, on the other side of the coin, the most efficient thing to do in this situation would be to have a single text link, thereby avoiding the issue entirely. .02
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Could also be that the concept has other ramifications not being taken into account. If shooting free throws "Like Mike" raises ones free throw percentage but as a consequence lowers one field goal percentage so the the net result is less total points, is it the concept or the execution that is flawed? Dave Last edited by crankydave; 03-07-2008 at 03:53 PM. |
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IF those nofollows affect visibility and placement on any other SE (again not saying it does or dosen't) to what degree and does it offset any potential Google gains? Is passing "value" through a single link better or is passing value through 2 links better IF that second link passes value? Is the combined value better, worse, or the same? What is the effect on "value passed" by the other links on the page? If any, is that effect desirable or is more value getting passed where you don't neccessarily need or want it? What is the effect of this with respect to other SE's? Dave |
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Unless I've missed something, I see the one of biggest issues one might face is an inability to test the effects of implementing the nofollow attribute as mentioned without waiting 3 months for another PR update.
IMHO, I doubt the average person would see any significant benefits unless they're running a large site with hundreds of links per page.
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. Printer ink & toner cartridges in Canada | Web Payroll, online HR tools, time & attendance |
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Recently Adam Lasnik in an interview suggested use of internal site nofollow other than for “PageRank sculpting”:
Video: Interview with Adam Lasnik of Google | Online Marketing Blog In an interview with Matt Cutts conducted by Eric Enge, Matt said: “What we’ve been doing is working with clients and telling them to take pages like their about us page, and their contact us page, and link to them from the home page normally, without a NoFollow attribute, and then link to them using NoFollow from every other page. It’s just a way of lowering the amount of link juice they get. These types of pages are usually the highest PageRank pages on the site, and they are not doing anything for you in terms of search traffic.” Matt Cutts Interviewed by Eric Enge on September 24, 2007 Another guy at PubCon had a private discussion with Matt Cutts. End result of conversation was a major change to his site adding nofollow to many pages that aren't really relevant to ranking for anything. rel="nofollow" for internal links Contradiction? Confusing? Or did I miss something? Also Michael Martinez wrote an excellent article about the abuse/wrong implementation of the nofollow attribute and more: Why Rand Fishkin’s nofollow post was wrong - SEO Theory - SEO Theory and Analysis Blog (Very worth reading) About excluding pages like "Privacy Policy", "TOS", e.t.c just to avoid a PageRank dilution, I do not think that it is a good practice in terms of a site's credibility. I am not sure if that factor might be at some point considered by search engines, but still I would not disallow those pages as they are equally important like all other pages. If they were not, why should I have them there anyway? Or should I add a stamp to those pages that they are not useful, trustworthy or even not safe for web? ME NOT! Don't miss this thread at Webmaster World too: Using No-Follow on Internal Links Cause a Drop in Rankings? I must admit that until some time ago I was using on my site the nofollow attribute for external affiliate links only, but I have replaced them after all with 302 redirects! Nofollow? Not for me. GREAT THREAD BY THE WAY! PEACE!
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO Last edited by Webnauts; 03-10-2008 at 07:07 AM. |
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But again. I do not suggest using the nofollow attribute. Oh and by the way did someone read this already? You'd Be Wise To "NoFollow" This Dubious SEO Advice This is what I am explaining my customers already since a while now. PEACE!
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO Last edited by Webnauts; 03-10-2008 at 07:21 AM. |
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I believe I was the first in SEO community to suspect "nofollow" and it's benefits, back in this wmw thread (10:37 pm and later replies).
Since then the word was spread all around. I also have a site with thousands of links where I have employed this technique and yes, my traffic improved for more than 30% based on this alone. However I am not sure about PR benefits as later I made a lot of other changes. |
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Peace!
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO Last edited by Webnauts; 03-10-2008 at 09:07 PM. |
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We cannot explain Google behavior for sure, we can only speculate.
* So, my initial reasoning was that Google introduced something like PR "leaking" to outgoing links. I thought of a percentage of PR, say 10%-20% leaking outside. * The second suspicion was that too many links on page trigger some negative filter. Earlier, Google stated recommendation about 100 links max per page. I haven't counted mine but it was probably outside the limits. * And finally, nofollow on particular internal links. Many of the links were to different landmarks on a single page, using named anchors. My theory was that several named anchors could cause multiple indexing of the same page, hence duplicate content issue. Add several different internal anchor text for the same page in a row and you get possible spam issue. Whether it was a single or multiple issue, adding rel="nofollow" to selected links helped that particular site a lot. Last edited by activeco; 03-11-2008 at 06:49 AM. |
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We were using on our site the "nofollow" attribute for external (affiliate) sites until 5-6 weeks ago. Then we got rid of the "nofollow" attribute, since we came up with an alternative and legitimate solution (302 Redirects), and if you believe it or not, our traffic is almost doubled. So what about that? Eliminating the "nofollow" attribute and doubled traffic? If you or someone else has doubts about our increased traffic, just PM me and I will send you the link to our AWStats. By the way, how about showing off that site which is successful using the "nofollow" attribute? I am still very curious. Peace.
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO |
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As I optimize gradually, waiting for two to three months after major change, it is easy to follow, with fair credibility, what works and what not. It should suffice to say that, in this particular case, adding 'nofollow' to all internal named anchors as well as to some outgoing links produced an increase from 350-400 in January to 500-550 uniques per day in April 2007 and it is not a seasonal behavior. In previous years the traffic was constant in that period. Today the site averages 900-1,000 unique visitors a day and the goal is 1,500 before December 2008, without ANY content change, which I will start optimizing hopefully in 2009. For those who cannot follow: What I mean with named anchors is this: <a href="page-x.html">Anchor text</a><BR> <a href="page-x.html#2" rel="nofollow">Anchor text b</a><B> <a href="page-x.html#3" rel="nofollow">Anchor text c</a> ... etc., so effectively linking only one particular url per page. |
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Google will not see the linked page as duplicated if you do not use the nofollow attributes. Or they will them count them as only 1 internal link, or if they will divide the PR juice though 3, the linked page will get PR of one. Originally the "nofollow" attribute was implemented for links to non-trustworthy, irrelevant sites. Don't you think there is a conflict when 3 links are leading to the same page and the one link says that the site is ok, and the other two links say it is not? Don't you see the contradiction there? Using different link text on more links of a page linking to one page is an accessiblity quidelines requirement. So it is not wrong in any case. I would suggest you to take advantage of that. Peace.
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO |
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While it is true that nofollow initially was for links to sites you could not, or did not, want to "vouch" for, that has since evolved. More simply it's "do not consider this link" with no real definition as to "why" you don't want it followed attached. As I have said, for my own reasons, I've chosen not to use it for internal links at this point. But I don't believe that anyone who does choose to use it for their own reasons, is somehow attaching a "negative" stigma to the target page. Dave Last edited by crankydave; 03-11-2008 at 11:39 AM. Reason: grammer |
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rel=Nofollow is invented for finer granularity and fighting non-trustworthy links is just a good way of using it. Quote:
Try it at home. Last edited by activeco; 03-11-2008 at 11:45 AM. |
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So next:
How to screw your Web site with nofollow - SEO Theory - SEO Theory and Analysis Blog Now you have some cool stuff to read at home. Peace.
__________________
"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO |
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO |
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Is there anything there that contradict my statements?
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Some additional info for Vanessa Fox:
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO |
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For the nofollow followers.
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"Being an expert isn't telling other people what you know. It's understanding what questions to ask, and flexibly applying your knowledge to the specific situation at hand. Being an expert means providing sensible, highly contextual direction." Jeff Atwood SEO Workers - Search Engine Optimization Consulting Company | SEO Analysis Tool | Webnauts Net SEO |
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Some behavior is really hard to understand.
The OP asked "Is this a stand alone technique that can benefit your website"? Well, my experience proved to myself the benefits of the technique although I wouldn't attribute it to widely thought PR reasons. I believe it could be a combination of a slight PR increase and raising of some filters in some particular cases. And that is it. I shared my experience which could be helpful to someone who can carefully read. If it is so easy to skip Mike's excellent comments (#3 of this thread), let me partially repeat it: Quote:
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A common fallacy is to take an observed correlation and ascribe a causal effect; i.e., I did "A" and observed "B," therefore "A" must be the cause of "B." Well, maybe, and maybe not.
Unless and until one understands how "A" might cause "B," and can then prove that "A" must cause "B," and that there is no other possible cause presently in play, one cannot say with certainty that such a causal relationship does in fact exist. In short, in order to prove a cause and effect relationship between "A" and "B," one must prove that the presence of "A" cannot not result in "B." So, to say that "I do not under stand how it works, only that it does" does not stand as proof that "it does."
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The Penn State Ticket Man http://www.pennstateticketman.com http://www.happyvalleytickets.com http://www.hounddogtours.com |
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Personally I feel like it's just a big waste of time to use the nofollow to try to get more PR to certain pages. But obviously, when you´re working on navigation (hierachy, categories, etc.) what you´re really doing is PR Sculpting. You´re creating the main flow of the link juice through the website.
Then you'll add some additional links to directly link to some pages which basically means you´re channeling extra PR to those pages. Now you could say that some institutional pages (like a contact page) don't really have that much value but you do need to link to them from the menu. In this case you could reason it is smart to nofollow these links in the menu. But really, what do you gain with that? 0.001% of extra PR for each of all the other pages? Is there anybody that all the sudden got tons of visitors extra after placing a couple of nofollows to channel PR? I like the 20 - 80 rule. Spend 20% of your time to gain 80% of the obtainable result. PR sculpting with nofollow definitely sits in the 80% of time that gets the other 20% of the obtainable result. I rather spend that 80% of my time on 4 more projects that can get me 4 times 80% more. Last time I checked 4 x 80% is about 16 times 1 x 20%.
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FREE SEO ! Really? YES! All you have to do is implement it! Follow me on Twitter PeterIMC |
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And, from that it follows that use of "nofollow" may in fact yield implications as to relative importance that run contrary to that implied by that structure itself. And, while this will, of course, not cause confusion for the human viewer, it might cause such for the SE's Indexing routines.
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The Penn State Ticket Man http://www.pennstateticketman.com http://www.happyvalleytickets.com http://www.hounddogtours.com |
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Decent post from Andy beard on the topic:
Site Structure - SEOs Going Fishing Without Any Bait | Andy Beard - Niche Marketing |
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A new scientific premise? Besides I provided a speculation about at least two possible reasons why it works. Is it so difficult to read the whole thread? Last edited by activeco; 03-13-2008 at 03:57 AM. |
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And, speculation, or conjecture, falls well short of proof.
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The Penn State Ticket Man http://www.pennstateticketman.com http://www.happyvalleytickets.com http://www.hounddogtours.com |
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Jeez. I would have to go some 30-35 years back in time to answer that.
You can have fun with this thread. Last edited by activeco; 03-14-2008 at 05:08 AM. |
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This post says it all nuff said as far as I am concerned:
Yes, Virginia, your contact page DOES need 500 links - SEO Theory - SEO Theory and Analysis Blog |
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