Tue 30 Jun 2009
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With the release of our new FREE wordpress plugin for comments yesterday, it appears we’re a dofollow blog again! Remember that?
Our new free plugin for WP comments released yesterday allows you to moderate exactly the comments you want to reward with link juice. That means every comment link in the comments in the Hobo site is ‘dofollow’ – no more ugly Nofollow links, as commenters below a certain number of links simply don’t get credited with a link. Of course, you can set the limit to whatever you want… my number is secret though I told Dave Naylor once 
As a result of this, I’m going to police the comments even more. So, if you’re commenting, use at least half a brain cell because I will out stupid dofollow comment spammers with no panache. 
I’m fortunate I do have intelligent folk commenting on this blog – it took a while!
Another bonus is that regular contributers to the blog should now have BETTER links from Hobo – for free.
Why We Released Hobo Link Love Plugin
Google’s Matt Cutts says:
Once a user has done a certain number of posts/edits, or has been around for long enough to build up trust, then those nofollows could be removed and the links could be trusted. Anytime you have a user that you’d trust, there’s no need to use nofollow links.
I love SEO and I love blogging. I think if blog comments are moderated and you’re watching who you link to, there’s no problem. You shouldn’t be upsetting Google, and you won’t risk linking to a bad neighbourhood.
With the recent changes regarding Google Pagerank and nofollow, this plugin goes a long way in addressing nofollow worries as complained loudly about in the following posts:
- http://www.mattcutts.com/blog/pagerank-sculpting/ – Matt Cutts Of Google caused all this
- http://www.hobo-web.co.uk/seo-blog/index.php/matt-cutts-kills-internal -pagerank-sculpting-with-nofollow/ I chipped in
- http://blog.searchenginewatch.com/090616-130132 – Kevin Newcomb of Search Engine Watch
- http://www.seomoz.org/blog/google-maybe-changes-how-the-pagerank-algor ithm-handles-nofollow Rand Fishkin of Seomoz chips in….
- http://www.seomoz.org/blog/google-says-yes-you-can-still-sculpt-pagera nk-no-you-cant-do-it-with-nofollow … a couple of times
- http://searchengineland.com/google-loses-backwards-compatibility-on-pa id-link-blocking-pagerank-sculpting-20408 – Danny Sullivan of Search Engine Land makes his views heard
- http://www.dailyseoblog.com/2009/06/page-rank-sculpting-using-nofollow -clarifications-from-google/ Mani Karthik has a nice round up
- http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2009-06-08-n72.html Philipp Lenssen chips in
- http://sphinn.com/story/117949 Plenty of folk talking about it at sphinn
- http://www.seofaststart.com/blog/googles-operation-bendover-exposed-no follow-pagerank-sculpting Dan Thies with a funny video on the whole issue
- http://www.webmasterworld.com/google/3925952.htm Webmasterworld folk discuss
- http://www.marketingpilgrim.com/2009/06/google-deprecates-pagerank-scu lpting-paid-javascript-links.html Jordan McCollum with a good simple roundup
- http://www.seroundtable.com/archives/020141.html SERoundtable with another roundup
Most of these posts are commenting on the way Google handles nofollow internally, but they include how it handles PR on your site if you run a blog with comments. The thinking is, if you have a lot of comments on a post, nofollow links to external commenter’s sites in your blog might actually be a drain on Google PR.
Andy Beard comments too here – Pageranks Sculpting & Blog Comments and another of my favourite bloggers, Sebastian, pipes in with this gem – http://sebastians-pamphlets.com/rip-rel-nofollow-funeral-party/
This plugin is one way to stop that PR drain happening – because you kiss nofollow links goodbye
Download the plugin here – It works on Wordpress 2.8, and should be backward compatible (though clearly no warranties – it’s free – use at your own risk)
Read the installation instructions on my last post
If you use the plugin, let me know how it works out for you.
PR sculpting is a thing on which my head has swirled for a long. I am still inconclusive about that, but i am a strong votary of rewarding people who consistently chip in with their good comments with dofollow, after all they work for that buck right?Its also a win-win game.BTW welcome back to the dofollow mode.
The question is will Matt Cutts start following his comment links?
Also how long before Google decide to chage their mind again?
It would be cool if Matt Cutts used the plugin
Ok. The dofollow thingy is tempting enough for me to start commenting. Even though I have started reading your blog recently I don’t have something concrete to say at the moment. But hopefully you won’t delete the comment as I plan to become a “trusted user”. I hope I used slightly more brain cells in constructing this stupid comment then the threshold you have set and that itself should make this comment pass through.
That works for me – Welcome aboard Alok
You will probably be on the dofollow search engines within half an hour
Great plugin – can’t wait to see how long it takes for Google to change their mind again (see James’ earlier post).
The whole thing is just a game. They roll the dice to get an advantage and then it is our turn…. over & over again.
To answer the question of Matt Cutts using dofollow on his links… when pigs fly.
@ Cory – lol probably. If Google does change their minds, it’s a one click un-install too
@David – I am aware of that
If it becomes a problem, I’ll just up the threshhold, therefore further rewarding those like your self that’s hanging around and making it ever harder for spammers.
@David – If that was meant for me “You will probably be on the dofollow search engines within half an hour ” then I don’t intend to test the threshold right away. Also I would prefer to have a good dofollow link to be up there so that the few people around who do follow it literally don’t end up following it for last time.
I like the notion that those who share their knowledge or inspire communication and learning through questions are rewarded so I am pleased with this new development!
I don’t think Matt Cutts with ever have dofollow on his comment links.
We went Do Follow and we use Comment and Keyword Luv. The catch is that we require a useful 20 word comment. Its part of what I call Scratch My Back Marketing. The commenter leaves useful comments (our scratch) and we provide use anchor text Do Follow links (their scratch.) This approach has worked very well for us.
We appreciate the benefit that commenters provide and we gladly reward them. It’s all about win/win marketing.
Great blog!
Thanks for the plug Shaun, and the plugin.
Cheers!
Mani
And I am gona read the installation instructions now.
Thanks for the plugin. Great blog!