Changes to nofollow links

Google has announced some big changes to nofollow links. In case you’re wondering, nofollow links are links which you want to identify as ones which aren’t given the weight of your full endorsement. They’re important for avoiding possible action from Google if you have ads or sponsored links on your site.

Two new link attributes instead of nofollow:

You can now use one or both of these:

• rel=”sponsored” for sponsored posts
• rel=”ugc” for user-generated content (e.g. links in comments)

Nofollow links won’t be ignored by Google anymore

Google says nofollow, sponsored, and ugc links still contain valuable information that can help them improve search. Instead of ignoring nofollow links like in the past, from March 2020 the three options will be considered “hints”.

Worried?

• If you have any ads and sponsored links on your site, ensure they are marked as nofollow or, even better, sponsored going forward to avoid possible action from Google.
• You don’t have to change any past nofollow links.
• Google does recommend using the new options moving forward.