Anyone who has had the slightest touch with website optimization has certainly heard of the nofollow HTML attribute that Google uses to indicate the ranking of a particular link on a site. This feature was introduced about 15 years ago, in 2005 to be exact. The attribute tells Google that a particular link is not trusted. Nofollow was originally designed to combat unwanted comments on a blog or in comments, which were an attempt to influence the positioning of the site that was linked in a not-so-dishonorable way.

Google has decided that after a long time of use, this attribute should evolve. For this reason, Google has announced the introduction of two new attributes that will help identify the nature of the link as clearly as possible.

NoFollow and other attributes

rel=”sponsored”: This attribute is used to indicate links on the site that are created as part of advertising, sponsored, or as part of some other compensation.

rel=”ugc”: The value of the user-generated content ( UGC) attribute is recommended for links that are generated within the content of the site, such as comments and forum posts.

rel=”nofollow”: This attribute is for cases where you want to link to a page, but you don’t want to imply any transfer of ranking credits to another page.

Google explains that this is an attempt to evaluate links more fairly, as well as to make it easier for the algorithm to rank the content of sites in Search. For this reason, in the future, nofollow will only be interpreted as a recommendation, and not as a sign that the link is completely ignored. According to Google, it will use the new attributes “as a way to better understand how to appropriately analyze and use links in our systems.” No significant changes in search results are expected as a result of this update. Google is now able to start using this data in its search ranking systems, and the change will give Google more flexibility in how it treats links with the nofollow attribute.

How the changes are reflected in SEO

However, the question arises whether these changes make sense, how do they generally reflect on SEO and whether it is necessary to make changes to already existing content? It’s unclear how Google thought the change would have a broader effect, when it said it wouldn’t have an impact on rankings, or if it did, it would be negligible. What motive would people have to adhere to this newspaper. The general conclusion of the community is that there are many doubts and ambiguities in the introduction of these novelties:

1. There is no incentive for website owners to use new link attributes
2. There is no benefit for website owners in the form of ranking improvement
3. The cost of implementing the change outweighs any perceived benefit (which is equal to zero at this point)

One of the ideas behind the significance of this change is that now not all nofollow links will be treated equally, which could primarily be reflected in links from forums or comments, which have credibility and importance in solving problems or educating the wider community. Forums are an expert source of information because people share their personal experiences with products, services, and advice in the form of responses. It would be fair to see them deserved to be recognized by Google. However, the question is how much this will be achieved in practice.

Another undesirable phenomenon that this change can bring is the sale of nofollow links, as well as the increase in spam comments, in an attempt to improve the position of a site.

Be that as it may, this is a change that has come to life these days, and we will be able to give the final assessment of its impact on the optimization of sites, and whether it exists at all, only after a certain time and possible changes that will be recorded.

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