Human Edited directories going nofollow

[CaptainSalad2]

just saw a premium human edited directory has slapped a no follow on all the links, interesting I suggest this will happen with all the "human edited" directories but then who will pay to use them?

[edited by: brotherhood_of_LAN at 7:19 pm (utc) on Feb 1, 2014]
[edit reason] removed specific directory name [/edit]

[FranticFish]

'Come check out our carefully curated collection of links... that we don't vouch for.'

[aristotle]

If this is a fee directory, then some people probably paid the fee in the belief that they would get a dofollow link, and could feel like they've been cheated, and might even demand a refund.

[netmeg]

Whether or not they pay will probably depend on whether or not they get actual traffic.

[7_Driver]

I'm not really surprised.

We're starting a new local directory - it's currently free to appear on - but it's going to be paid - and we're NoFollowing all the links.

I would like to give people the extra value of a followed link - but once the directory goes paid - I think there's a risk it might do them more harm than good. After all, it's a paid link.

Even though we'd have lots of editorial content about each business - and make sure only eligible businesses can get into the directory (no online only spammers!) - when push comes to shove - if they're paying and we're linking - soon or later Google will penalise them for it.

The advantage of appearing in the directory will be to get seen by real customers (remember those?) not to improve your position in serps.

To be honest I don't really see why any webmaster would give a followed link these days: Google's always telling us to build for people, not search engines. NoFollowed links work perfectly well for people, so why expose yourself to the risks* of giving a followed link?

eg Being penalised because the link is mis-interpreted as paid, or incentivised or on a guest post or whatever Google declared war on last week.

[aakk9999]

To be honest I don't really see why any webmaster would give a followed link these days: Google's always telling us to build for people, not search engines. NoFollowed links work perfectly well for people, so why expose yourself to the risks* of giving a followed link?

And here then goes away the foundation of Google's algo (unless they in some way do take into account nofollow links...)

[CaptainSalad2]

Yea I wonder if people will demand refunds? It was a directory linked to a number of times on some major SEO websites as a "good link". You can pay a yearly fee or one off payment which was 3 years worth of fees. It was a PR6 until the last toolbar PR update and now its a 3 and only just slapped everything with a nofollow, I only noticed it because I was looking at a clients backlinks and knew it used to be a dofollow directory!

I don't see anyone paying to join a human edited directory for a nofollow link. lets be honest who uses them to "find" things? I see this as the beginning of the end for human edited directories...

[creative craig]

aakk9999 - over the last 18 months I've run some simple tests with nofollow links trying to determine if Google give them any weight. I personally think they do, but I only have anecdotal evidence, nothing I'd bet the house on :)

If I can only get a nofollow link I'll take it any day over no link at all.

[incrediBILL]

My directories never directly passed the link, just like WebmasterWorld doesn't directly pass the link, and that was before nofollow ever came along.

[ken_b]

I can't remember, does Bing treat nofollow links the same way Google does?

[philgames]

Surely putting no follow is building for the search engines and not for people..after all people will only see the no follow tag in the source code.

[7_Driver]

You're building with search engines in mind (like any on-page SEO) - but NoFollowed links work just fine for people - they won't care either way...

[roshaoar]

@creative craig - My hunch would be that Google measures links several ways, both as a link (which gets a zero score being nofollowed) and through some click through ratio metric (which if people click through does give some benefit, even being nofollowed). No evidence, just the way I'd do it if I were them :)

[graeme_p]

I had a page that had a much higher toolbar PR than any other page on the site, but I could find no incoming links other than multiple links from wikipedia (multiple because it was linked to from some foreign language wikipedias as well).

I also find it hard to believe that Google entirely ignores nofollow links. There is too much abuse of nofollow (e.g. sites that nofollow everything) and too much useful data.

[rish3]

Perhaps we need something like rel="scared" for situations where the publisher is clearly vouching for the link, but just paranoid about potential penalties.

Or, in the case of that big "how to" site, rel="stolen-from" for links placed in a "REFERENCES" section that indicate the source of the thinly rewritten, posted content. They are currently using "nofollow" in this case, which is just funny.

[CaptainSalad2]

I see G+ is now "nofollowing" links, since G doesn't use facebook/twitter signals (confirmed by mat) what are these "social signal" the SEO bloggers have been going on about being so important for SEO rankings, not general marketing, rankings? How long till Pinterest goes nofollow?

[ColourOfSpring]

What kind of signal does a site give out if all links are no-followed? It just looks like the site doesn't trust any of its links at all. And if that's the signal you show to Google, I don't see that as being a good one.

[rish3]

How long till Pinterest goes nofollow?

They appear to be nofollow right now. They have switched back and forth a few times.

[ColourOfSpring]

The more prevasive nofollow is, the more value/power is given to dofollow links. Imagine if all the big influential sites went nofollow....

[rish3]

Imagine if all the big influential sites went nofollow

Like facebook, twitter, pinterest, youtube, wikipedia, linkedin, instagram, flickr, ? Already there :)

[ColourOfSpring]

Good point - and those platforms are where surely most things are being shared / talked about.

[EditorialGuy]

those platforms are where surely most things are being shared / talked about.

Yes, but Google has said that social signals are "noisy," and with good reason: It's a lot easier to click a "Like" button or retweet a tweet than it is to create a link on a Web site. (In theory, at least, a link is a citation; a "Like," "+1," or other social signal is the online equivalent of a "Hey, cool," a smile, or a laugh.)

[CaptainSalad2]

lol I just had a client ring me and ask if he should "unfollow" people on twitter because they heard a lot about google clamping down on business's who have to many "dofollow" links. Priceless, I was tempted to say "it couldn't hurt"

wow

[incrediBILL]

who will pay to use them

People that want traffic and exposure.

You youngsters don't even factor in that directories provide a source of information where people often go when researching a topic so they can find things buried and unavailable in search engines.

For instance any curated list, such as AngiesList wouldn't be popular at all if the search engine could deliver the same data but they can't.

The way directories keep themselves current is to add more value such as reviews, business details, things that can help visitors find what they want faster and easier. While most think of Yelp as a review site, technically it's a big directory with lot's of value added features such as reviews and pictures. People use Yelp to get crowd sourced opinions about the businesses listed.

Hoeever, there's a big difference between real directories and garbage sites, nobody will use the garbage anymore. As far as the little junk directories that spawned up en masse over the last decade that are only there to collect cash in exchange for DOFOLLOW links, or the MFA (made for adsense) sites, those spammy things will hopefully dry up and go away. They never had any value except in link schemes, even that was questionable, which is why they're now charging those same customers more to remove the link and DISAVOW it from their link graph.

I warned people to avoid those junk directories but too many people are too impatient, not playing for the long term, looking for that quick buck and then shrieking like crazy when it all blows up in their faces.

Sigh.

[jdancing]

I have never ever used a directory to find something I was looking for since the olden days of the early Yahoo directory.

No-follow, no-money from me. I was in one of the top 'legit" directories for years and happily paid a yearly fee. Then one day I noticed they switched all paid directory links to no-follow without notice.

I checked my stats closely for visitors this directory over the previous few years. Maybe there were one or two, but I believe there were none.

[FranticFish]

Directories that drive traffic are very rare in my experience, and even if they DO drive traffic, then the cost does not compare at all favourably with AdWords.

I've started looking into banner ads for clients. Every time I've calculated the CPC, even when I'm being generous to the site and taking a very high CTR, again it just doesn't compete with AdWords.

Maybe I'm looking at the wrong sites, maybe it's the niches I'm looking in, but I've yet to see paid traffic that comes close to matching AdWords. And AdWords is searchers not surfers.

At least when you buy banner ads you have a cost per thousand impressions. A directory that wants a (yearly) fee up front on the assumption that you'll get some traffic? I'll pass.

Nofollow, no money from me either - unless the site has a CPC payment model.

[incrediBILL]

I checked my stats closely for visitors this directory over the previous few years. Maybe there were one or two, but I believe there were none.

Blame Google for the lack of traffic.

Ironically, Google used all of the original directories as hubs (and still may!) to figure out where all the sites were in the internet and initially those directories got top dog status as they were the hub of the web. Fast forward a few years and Google decides the sites themselves should be promoted over those nicely curated directories and suddenly you get just any old site in any old order and the curated hubs are nowhere to be found.

Thanks Google you leaching backstabbing...

[EditorialGuy]

Fast forward a few years and Google decides the sites themselves should be promoted over those nicely curated directories

Makes sense to me. Still, anyone who thinks there's a pent-up demand for directories should get some VC money and start a high-profile "directory of directories" for people who are tired of spidered search. Or maybe Yahoo! could ditch Bing search results, announce the Yahoo! Back to the Future Initiative, and change its home page to this:

[wayback.archive.org...]

[rish3]

Or perhaps Google could resurrect their own directory.

Google Directory [images.seroundtable.com]

[incrediBILL]

Or perhaps Google could resurrect their own directory.

That was just a copy of DMOZ

start a high-profile "directory of directories" for people who are tired of spidered search.

I've always thought the best mix would be a spidered search of just the sites in the directories only, with everything else in the world falling into a supplemental index.

Basically, if your site didn't cut the mustard to get into the directory it didn't get totally discarded, just below everything else that was of sufficient quality to actually be in the directory.

Basically, only searching the sites in DMOZ for example as the primary index with everything else available but not a high priority.

Would certainly solve the web spam problem once and for all!

Until we get real AI, we're it, the only way to really get a clean index is for humans to be responsible for policing it, not wacko algorithms that randomly throw innocent sites under the bus with no recourse.

Whether it was a "nofollow" directory wouldn't matter much now would it? :)