Having started up this blog only a short while back, I am still in the throes of adding quality content to get the blog up and running properly. I am enjoying the process and writing is fun but… as the floodgates begin to open, the spam starts rolling in…

Obviously this Blog is moderated and I delete blatant spam as soon as it appears, the trouble is I’m getting a lot of comments that are in between being blatant spam and being insightful.

I have therefore been struggling with the nofollow / dofollow question and whether I should apply these tags to the post comments on this Blog.

What are Nofollow / Dofollow tags?

A link with a nofollow tag will appear the same to the general web going public as a link without the tag, but by implementing the nofollow tag the Blog or Forum owner is telling the search engines that this link has not been checked (or is not from a trusted source) and that the link should therefore pass no link juice or power to the resulting page.   At least that is the official line; there is some debate as to how the tag is really being dealt with by Google and the other search engines.  Tests have been run that prove that the Search Engines at least follow the nofollow links to their destination whether the resulting pages receive any link juice is open to debate.

Nofollow tags are implemented as follows:

Visit my <a href=” http://www.justinmarch.com/cheltenham-gloucester-web-design-seo-offer/”>SEO Company Cheltenham</a> site.
Which would look like this: SEO Company Cheltenham

Applying a nofollow tag, the comment would be transformed to:

Visit my <a href=” http://www.justinmarch.com/cheltenham-gloucester-web-design-seo-offer/” rel=”nofollow”> SEO Company Cheltenham</a> site.
Which would look like this: SEO Company Cheltenham

As you can see both of the above links look exactly the same to the casual observer.

NB: There is no dofollow tag; essentially dofollow is simply a “normal” hyperlink (or the absence of the nofollow tag).

Find out more about the background of the nofollow tag here: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2005/01/preventing-comment-spam.html

See David Leonhardts’ blog post for even more insight into this debate.

So what to do about Nofollow / Dofollow tags on this Blog?

I act to prevent spam as much as possible but am also willing to reward insightful comments with a dofollow link, the trouble is I’m getting a lot of comments that are in between, they aren’t blatant spam and they aren’t quite as insightful as I would like.

The problem  is it’s a trade off, I don’t want to put people off, and I don’t mind a bit of banter as it helps to humanise my Blog, on the other hand I don’t want to necessarily reward banter with a dofollow link.

Option 1:

• delete the spam
• nofollow the in-between comments
• follow the insightful comments

Option 2:

• delete the spam
• delete the in-between comments
• follow the insightful comments

Option 3:

• delete the spam
• follow in-between comments
• follow the insightful comments

Conclusion

For the moment anyway I think that option 1 is the most ideal I will just have to put up with the questions relating to why some comments are assigned nofollow where others are given normal link status.

I look forward to pleanty of insightful comments on this below…