DoFollow Links Series #002 - The meaning of Dofollow vs Nofollow
DoFollow Links Series #002 - The meaning of Dofollow vs Nofollow
How to know if a link is dofollow or nofollow?
In this issue, we talk about:
Dofollow Links meaning, Dofollow vs Nofollow
How do you know what type of link you’re getting?
5 fresh backlinks opportunities, 4 juicy dofollow links, and 1 nofollow (still good)
Let's go!
1. What’s the meaning of “dofollow links”?
As I shortly explained in the last email, dofollow links pass juice and give a vote of trust to the linked website, while nofollow backlinks are more like mentions.
When a website links another website (the link can be a button, image, or text) by default, the link is dofollow.
However, they can add different attributes to them to show they don't want those links to get their vote of authority (to pass juice as people say)
How does dofollow vs nofollow function, technically?
This can be achieved by adding
rel="nofollow"
rel="sponsored"
rel="UGC"
to the HTML code behind that link.
The sponsored attribute is usually used for paid content or affiliate links
The UGC attribute is mostly used for content users of the platform created.
All 3 are considered to signal search engines not to pass the juice from that platform to linked websites.
In practice, a dofollow link would look like this:
<a href="https://businessdirectorysites.com">A directory of directories</a>
And the nofollow ones can look like this
<a href="https://kwfinder.com/#a5bed5c79af09ff23d3a1cb7e" rel="sponsored">Keyword tool</a>
(example above for linking to a sponsored tool)
About Nofollow Links:
While the consensus is that nofollow links are not helpful, many people still consider them useful even as useful as dofollow backlinks.
These people argue there are still benefits (like indexing and syndication) from nofollow links and that we are also not 100% sure they don't matter, from an authority passing point of view.
I tend to agree with this view. You should get nofollow links from a high authority domain, especially if it is contextual/related to your niche.
To add another argument, an organic backlink profile has its percentage of nofollow links. Anything between 10% and 30% looks natural.
There are no exact rules here, and you shouldn't panic if you have more or less, but I strongly believe you should have both types.
As I said in a recent tweet:
“Don't take mine or anyone else's words as rules. In SEO there are only (in the best case) educated guesses (from experience) After all Google can change the rules overnight and it's always a cat-and-mouse game. But we do our best and sometimes we win!”
2. How can you know which type of backlink you have?
You can look at the code, by selecting the link, right click and Inspect to see the code on your desktop/laptop.
You can use different Chrome extensions like “Detailed SEO Extension” which has an option to highlight the nofollow links.
Because they have limitations and do not highlight the dofollow links in some cases, I use multiple extensions and look at the code manually.
The extension I use the most is from this SEO tool because it displays every link on the page with its attributes DF (green) and NF (red). The results look like this:
Here we focus on the dofollow backlinks (as the newsletter name suggests). You should expect around 80% of the backlinks opportunities shared to be dofollow.
5 Fresh Juicy Dofollow Links
Link 006 - Are.na
Metrics:
Linktype: dofollow
DA 59
Cost: free
Details: a platform for saving and organizing content. You create an account, the account has channels of content. In these channels, you can add blocks, that can be your websites (links). The channel should be closed (cannot be altered by the public) but not private (so it is visible).
Link 007 - Bento.me
Metrics:
Linktype: dofollow
DA 59
Cost: free
Details: a rich link-in-bio page with video, maps, music, links, socials and more embedded. Just create your profile, and populate your page with your socials, websites, and projects. Pro tip: add relevant text to make the links more contextual.
Link 008 - Biopage.com
Metrics:
Linktype: dofollow
DA 34
Cost: free
Details: Another link in bio. Create and confirm a new account. In the biography tab, edit your profile. Add social accounts and your website under the “on social media” area. Use your bio page to post updates about your business.
Note: having multiple link-in-bio pages is not an issue but a benefit. Promote all so they are indexed, and add other websites, pages, and your social media to them when you create something new. This proves to search engines the authenticity of your business, many websites suffer in this area. Plus you get the benefits of juicy dofollow links, as many have high authority.
Link 009 - indiepa.ge
Metrics:
Linktype: dofollow
DA 25 (growing since in Ahrefs it has DR 58)
Cost: paid ($25/year or $45/lifetime)
Details: You pay, create your indie page, and showcase your projects. The great thing is your projects are included in a startup directory with pages already indexed in search engines, so you get the link juice faster.
To do that click the category tag, a button under each project you add, that helps you select the category for the directory.
There are only hundreds of projects listed, so it’s not spammed (paid links are great in this way unlike free directories, where sometimes there are millions of listings.
Link 010 - Allmyfaves.com
Metrics:
Linktype: nofollow (still useful as explained above)
DA 61
Cost: free
Details: a bookmarking platform, Allmyfaves.com allows you to create an account and add links in different tabs (categories). Your profile and any tab can be shared online. This is where the backlinks to your projects are. The links are nofollow.
Just one thing before we finish. As I share these links for free and have a lot of work with my other projects (I’ll talk more about them in the next emails) the schedule for this newsletter won’t be strict. Expect one every week or so but don’t mind if I take my time. The idea is to provide value and to have fun while writing these. Thank you for understanding this!
All right, that’s it for now, see you in the next one!
Dorian, over and out🫡
P.S. Some links shared in these emails can and will be affiliate or sponsored links!