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June 16, 2009
Google Further Clarifies Nofollow and PageRank Sculpting
Earlier this month, Matt Cutts shared with search marketers that Google had begun treating nofollow differently, especially in regards to "PageRank sculpting," the advanced SEO tactic that aims to control where PageRank flows around a site.
Today, he goes into detail on how Google views PageRank sculpting, and how it treats the nofollow attribute in regards to PageRank flow.
Cutts offers a simplified description of the PageRank process, where a page's value flows out to the various pages it links to equally. When the nofollow attribute originally came on the scene, Google would just remove those links from the equation, according to Cutts. So if a page with 10 "PageRank points" to share had ten links on it, and five were nofollowed, each regular link would pass two PageRank points.
Cutts today said that Google changed this practice more than a year ago to keep the nofollowed links in the equation, but not passing any PageRank points. So in that same example, the regular links would each pass 1 PageRank point, and the nofollowed links would still "use up" their allotted points, even though they did not pass those points on.
Cutts once again reiterated his stance that PageRank sculpting is not the best way for an SEO to spend his or her time:
I wouldn't recommend it, because it isn't the most effective way to utilize your PageRank. In general, I would let PageRank flow freely within your site. The notion of "PageRank sculpting" has always been a second- or third-order recommendation for us. I would recommend the first-order things to pay attention to are 1) making great content that will attract links in the first place, and 2) choosing a site architecture that makes your site usable/crawlable for humans and search engines alike.
For example, it makes a much bigger difference to make sure that people (and bots) can reach the pages on your site by clicking links than it ever did to sculpt PageRank. If you run an e-commerce site, another example of good site architecture would be putting products front-and-center on your web site vs. burying them deep within your site so that visitors and search engines have to click on many links to get to your products.
There may be a miniscule number of pages (such as links to a shopping cart or to a login page) that I might add nofollow on, just because those pages are different for every user and they aren't that helpful to show up in search engines. But in general, I wouldn't recommend PageRank sculpting.
Why is Google sharing this information now, a year after the change was made? Apparently, they were hoping that SEOs would notice the change and report on it themselves, but they didn't. Then Matt's repeated assertions that PR sculpting wasn't a good use of time went unheeded as well.
One of the biggest ways this affects most search marketers is on pages with user comments that are nofollowed. In the early days of nofollow, those pages would have received a boost over their pre-nofollowed state, since the PageRank taken up by those links would be redistributed by other links on the page.
But as of Google's change last year, those pages should have reverted to their pre-nofollow state, where the nofollowed links did use up PageRank. But with nofollow, those nofollowed links don't share PageRank with other sites, it just dissipates.
But Cutts advises against deciding not to turn off comments to avoid linking out at all:
I wouldn't recommend closing comments in an attempt to "hoard" your PageRank. In the same way that Google trusts sites less when they link to spammy sites or bad neighborhoods, parts of our system encourage links to good sites.
Posted by Kevin Newcomb on June 16, 2009 1:01 PM
Comments
Ateizam June 17, 2009 2:50 AM
I am new to this seo and page rank and I don't get most of it at all. I try to learn new things quickly but once I do learn something new about seo, along comes another bit of seo that i have to learn.
Attractions in Blackpool June 19, 2009 12:44 PM
when matt says himself that its of no use, should we really trust on that? because as far as i think, Google is always tryimg to strangle SEO practice and this is a clear example of that....nice writing, i liked the way you raised the point of "Why is Google sharing this information now, a year after the change was made?" and matt should answer this now!
anna June 24, 2009 1:08 AM
Somebody better alert Stompernet, Dan Thies and Leslie Rodhe because they just taught me why it’s important to structure your page rank. I can’t believe that I just finished putting the time into placing the “No Follow” tag into my wbepages so my PR2 “Home Page” gives the entire PR to my “Sitemap” where the PR will then be distributed only to important pages of my website (in my case 4 links). Now Matt is saying that’s wrong to do. This is one of the reasons why beginners to SEO and internet marketing get so confused that it makes you really feel like quitting.
J.E. Pride
Medical Billing Business Owner July 2, 2009 5:29 PM
The page rank dilemma continues and information from google remains as secretive as ever. From my research I get mixed messages on nofollow links. Some people say they are completely useless and others say some smaller search engines still count them. When it comes to my link building strategies I throw down relevant comments on blogs without nofollow in a heartbeat. When I search the source code of the page and find nofollow I am hesitant to post a comment unless it can be done quickly and have relevance.
Building Back Links for PR July 20, 2009 9:30 PM
I am glad to see Matt Cutts is out there explain things. But as far as i am concerned, his notes are too technical, and confusing! How nice could it be if he explains what you can do, and what you can not. Sometimes i feel strange when he stand out and talk about SEO, and meantime say content is the king. So if you write great content, and wait NY times link to you? I don't think it's practical, if one want to be found on the Internet nowadays, have to look into many SEO promotion methods, such as link building.
Victoria Cruises August 24, 2009 10:59 AM
Google keeps its lead in the search world by presenting the most relevant search results. SEO (white hat or black hat) tries to trick Google into giving more weight to what it would normally consider to be *less* relevant results. Complaining that Google doesn't make it easy to do SEO is like complaining that the IRS doesn't hand out offshore tax-shelter information.
I'm actually impressed with how much Google *does* reach out to the SEO world -- it's cool that Matt gave out this information at all. In fact, despite my earlier analogy, SEO can bring *some* benefit to Google, to the extent that a bit of SEO can make good information easier to find; however stuff like pagerank sculpting really brings Google (and its millions of users) no benefit at all, so I'm not surprised that Google has brought in countermeasures, as much as I wish I could use sculpting on my OurAirports site to boost the PR.
David Megginson August 31, 2009 2:20 PM
I am new to the web and SEO but I am happy that I found this information today because I was told recently that sculpting the way my PR flows will help me gain traction in the SERP's. Needless to say I followed their advice and while it seemed to work for a while I noticed that all the pages I tried to influence lost their value. Since then I have changed back to a regular internal linking strategy and hopefully I will regain what I lost listening to people that only look for quick fixes to a problem.
Thanks Google, Matt and all those that have posted their thoughts here.
Donna
Donna Tartadlione October 11, 2009 1:44 PM
Great, first Google tells us to sculpt PageRank to help our sites, then secretly changes their policies to hurt sites that sculpt PageRank, then decides to tell us about it a year after the change. I can see how this was a change they needed to make, a change that would also be extremely embarrassing to Google, but they should have told us a year ago. Even this most recent message is confusing; does this also apply to external nofollowed links, or just internal ones?
iGuide November 13, 2009 1:11 PM
No follow is still beneficial to even those who leave comments on blogs, but with all the confusion from the no follow vs the do follow mentalities, many people have over-looked the benefit of even commenting on sites that use the no-follow attribute for their comment form. And, many bloggers thought that using the "You Comment, We Follow" mentality was the best for their blog popularity, but in the long run it's been tough on their page rank.
Tammara November 27, 2009 9:57 PM
Dividends are taxed whether they are reinvested or withdrawn.A municipal bond fund pays dividends that are exempt from Federal tax and MAY be exempt from state tax depending as to what state you are in.
Don't let tax consequences be the primary driving force from which investment you choose though. I would rather get a 12% return from a taxable account than a 4% return from a non-taxable one.
Online Tax Preparation
Online Tax Preparation January 6, 2010 12:16 AM
Dividends are taxed whether they are reinvested or withdrawn.A municipal bond fund pays dividends that are exempt from Federal tax and MAY be exempt from state tax depending as to what state you are in.
Don't let tax consequences be the primary driving force from which investment you choose though. I would rather get a 12% return from a taxable account than a 4% return from a non-taxable one.
Online Tax Preparation
Online Tax Preparation January 6, 2010 12:16 AM
Thanks for the informations
Vampal January 11, 2010 1:05 AM
It is always confusing with regards to google ranking strategy, i think it makes sense for them to not reveal everything.
Stocks to buy January 25, 2010 1:59 PM
why are they making the process of increasing page rank harder each time they make an update
Farouk February 3, 2010 7:05 AM
For us who are new to SEO, this is pretty confusing... Google doesn't provide enough information, and other resources often are not accurate, so many of us need to experience things by ourselves and that consumes time... A lot of time... Well, that's why SEO is well payed job, not all of people can do it. It's like gathering information and solving a puzzle (-:
That's why each piece of info is welcomed. Thanks for the post!