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External Nofollow

Discussion in 'Link Development' started by mdvaldosta, Mar 14, 2006.

  1. #1
    When reading someone's post about Matt Cutts using nofollow tags on user comments (duh!) my little handy dandy javascript function wasn't picking those links up as nofollow.

    Looking at the source, I see it's not the typical rel="nofollow", but instead rel="external nofollow". What's the scoop? I found this on the wordpress site:

    Isn't that alittle redundant? Wonder if their's more to it?
     
    mdvaldosta, Mar 14, 2006 IP
    BamaStangGuy likes this.
  2. BamaStangGuy

    BamaStangGuy Notable Member

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    #2
    Interesting find. Not sure what they mean by that
     
    BamaStangGuy, Mar 14, 2006 IP
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  3. nightmaster

    nightmaster Peon

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    #3
    So are those attributes "external nofollow" and "external" supported by the search engines?
     
    nightmaster, Feb 23, 2007 IP
  4. trichnosis

    trichnosis Prominent Member

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    #4
    all the tags are same in google eyes .
     
    trichnosis, Feb 23, 2007 IP
  5. nightmaster

    nightmaster Peon

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    #5
    hmm, so why have them in the first place?
     
    nightmaster, Feb 23, 2007 IP
  6. MindBlogger

    MindBlogger Peon

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    #6
    It's a way of telling Google not to weigh the link juice passed through that link.
     
    MindBlogger, Jul 18, 2008 IP
  7. raybman

    raybman Active Member

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    #7
    I initially thought maybe the rel="external nofollow" syntax would nullify the statement, but because there is a space between external and nofollow the function is the same.
     
    raybman, Jul 26, 2008 IP
  8. sapanbhatt

    sapanbhatt Active Member

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    #8
    you mean to say finally it won't follow the link?
     
    sapanbhatt, Aug 14, 2008 IP
  9. raybman

    raybman Active Member

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    #9
    Correct, it will not follow.
     
    raybman, Aug 14, 2008 IP
  10. Gallito

    Gallito Peon

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    #10
    Still won't follow it one way or another, it is just adding an extra phrase so that search engines know it isn't a link within the page.
     
    Gallito, Aug 14, 2008 IP
  11. doups3

    doups3 Member

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    #11
    So am I correct in saying that there is no SEO difference between rel="nofollow" and rel="external nofollow" in eyes of google?
     
    doups3, Aug 21, 2008 IP
  12. Dodger

    Dodger Peon

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    #12
    Here is everything you need know about existing rel microformat values. That one page contains tables of known rel values from specifications, formats, proposals, brainstorms, and non-trivial POSH usage in the wild. In addition, dropped and rejected values are listed at the end for comprehensiveness.

    external = Indicates that the referenced document is not part of the same site as the current document. It is also an Html 5 Spec proposal.

    nofollow = indicates that the destination of that hyperlink SHOULD NOT be afforded any additional weight or ranking by user agents which perform link analysis upon web pages (e.g. search engines).
     
    Dodger, Aug 21, 2008 IP
  13. seosheen

    seosheen Peon

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    #13
    yup he explain it wel.
     
    seosheen, Aug 21, 2008 IP
  14. sapanbhatt

    sapanbhatt Active Member

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    #14
    others are saying that it will boost your link popularity...? Is it true?
     
    sapanbhatt, Aug 21, 2008 IP
  15. sheds

    sheds Peon

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    #15
    wel explain Dodger!
     
    sheds, Aug 22, 2008 IP
  16. AngelaE8654

    AngelaE8654 Active Member

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    #16
    Yeah, that's what I thought.
     
    AngelaE8654, Aug 22, 2008 IP
  17. Synchronium

    Synchronium Active Member

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    #17
    If they both do exactly the same thing, I'd suggest using rel="nofollow" for both external and internal links. This then reduces the size of your page with no downside.

    Good for the user (slightly quicker load)
    Good for your bandwidth (a few bytes multiplied by a million over a few years might add up to something)
    Good for SEO? Less of the "same old stuff" means your template is slightly smaller than it would be, possibly reducing the likelyhood of a duplicate content penalty?

    Any further ideas?
     
    Synchronium, Aug 22, 2008 IP
  18. Dodger

    Dodger Peon

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    #18
    The rel values of 'nofollow' and 'external' are NOT the same. I think a few people are getting confused about this.

    Everyone knows the meaning of 'nofollow' and there is no need to rehash that here. There does seem to be a lot of clouded stares over the 'external' value and, why it is there or what is it's purpose.

    What I know is that 'external' is new, and is part of the specification draft for HTML5. Without any surprise, 'nofollow' is part of that draft also.

    Other link/anchor rel values proposed in the HTML5 draft include 'archives', 'prefetch', 'feed', 'icon', 'pingback', 'sidebar', and 'up'.

    Now, if you have a WordPress blog (or read one) and analyze the link rel value in the comments area, you have undoubtedly spotted the this combo of microformats. That is because the powers to be at WordPress have hardcoded the pair into one of the core files (wp-includes/comment-functions.php).

    The reason for including 'external' in the rel value is pretty clear in my mind, Wordpress wants your Html to be HTML5 compliant
     
    Dodger, Aug 22, 2008 IP
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  19. vjlenin

    vjlenin Active Member

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    #19
    External means, the link will be opened in another window. Nofollow means it will not be indexed. Your little javascript or CSS tweak needs to be updated to reflect the external nofollow tag as well.
     
    vjlenin, Aug 22, 2008 IP
  20. Dodger

    Dodger Peon

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    #20
    Umm, not quite true.

    External does not open a new browser window/tab. The attribute target="_blank" does.

    Technically, Nofollow only states that the link should not receive any link merit. Nofollow is actually a misnomer. SE crawlers are still free to follow the link to the other side -- and I think that they all will follow the link.
     
    Dodger, Aug 22, 2008 IP