I have 2 simple questions that have been bugging me for some time. 1. I`m thinking of making all the url on my forum nofollow. I know that bots may still follow but the real question is do I have anything to lose by implementing it? 2. I would also like to generate a sitemap for the forum. Yes or no? Thanx
1. You won't be loosing anything in this case. 2. Sitemaps are mega cool, they will help Google bot crawl all your internal pages.
I agree with dzi's comments. I assume you meant that you are going to make all external links nofollow. This is a good idea as it limits the benefits of people who spam your forum. Don't do this for all of your internal links as it would limit the number of indexed pages. A sitemap is definitely a good idea. It helps the search engines find all of your pages. Adding a sitemap can increase your number of indexed pages, which in turn could result in more traffic.
forums are being used for open discussions n people use it for link purpose....if u would make it no follow people would reduce the chance coz thru do follow they are getting benefit from both end. so i would not recommend you to go for this...2nd 1 site map is good idea ...it will help out search engine to index your internal pages.
If you can administrate the website, I think you should leave the forum on Dofollow. It should mean more people will come to your forum, even if it is to promote their new site etc. they may stay & as long as it's relevant & helpful there's no harm. As long as you can delete the proper spam!