Dofollow Backlink SEO, The Link That Carries Weight
Summarise this blog
Key Takeaways
- A dofollow link is any ordinary link with no rel=”nofollow”, rel=”sponsored” or rel=”ugc” attribute, so search engines follow it and count it as a vote for the destination page.
- “Dofollow” is not an HTML attribute. It is the default state of a link; only nofollow, sponsored and ugc are real attributes, and Google has treated them as hints since 2019.
- Dofollow links from authoritative sites raise a page’s authority, bring referral visits, help Googlebot crawl, and lift the chance of ranking for the target keyword.
- Safe ways to earn them are guest articles, quality directories, relationships with creators, and outreach; buying links breaks Google’s spam policies and risks a penalty.
- Quality outweighs quantity, and links should accumulate naturally over time rather than in a burst.
Information now spreads online at speed, which makes a website ranking near the top of Google’s results essential for a brand of any size, because it makes the brand known and reaches its audience fast. Pushing a site onto the first page takes more than a good, easy-to-use site. One factor nobody can do without is backlinks, and dofollow links in particular, which act as a vote of confidence that other sites give yours, so Google reads the site as credible and high-quality.
For anyone still asking what a dofollow link is and why it matters for SEO, this article has the answer.
Table of Contents
What Is A Dofollow Link
A dofollow link is a link from one website to another that carries no special attribute such as “nofollow”, “ugc” or “sponsored”. Because nothing tells search engines to ignore it, Google follows the link and counts it as a vote that affects the destination site’s rank in search results.
Dofollow links work much like backlinks generally, which build connections between sites. The more quality backlinks a site earns, and the more of them, the better its chance of a top rank. Google’s bots follow these links to analyse how sites connect, which raises the chance of the destination being indexed in the search engine’s database.
Why Dofollow Links Matter For SEO
- They raise the site’s authority. When a site with high authority links to yours, Google reads yours as quality, which lifts its SEO standing.
- They bring visits. Dofollow links do not only help a site rank higher on Google. They bring visitors, because when a user clicks the link from another site to yours, the visit arrives with it.
- They improve how Google crawls. Dofollow links help Googlebot crawl the site better, so Google understands the structure clearly.
- They lift the chance of ranking for a keyword. With many quality dofollow links, Google reads the site as relevant to the keyword you want to rank for, so that keyword has a better chance of ranking higher.
Dofollow Vs Nofollow, How The Two Differ
The difference between a dofollow link and a nofollow link is significant.
A dofollow link is a vote for a site. When site A places a dofollow link to site B, it tells Google that site B is credible and worth attention, which gives site B a better chance of ranking in Google’s results. A nofollow link tells Google “this link does not need weight”.
When site A uses a nofollow link to site B, Google does not count the link towards ranking, so site B gains no SEO benefit from it. Since 2019 Google has treated nofollow, and the sponsored and ugc attributes introduced alongside it, as hints rather than absolute directives, but the practical effect for most links is unchanged.
How To Build Dofollow Links Correctly And Safely, Link Building That Holds
Build dofollow links properly and naturally, so Google does not read the work as spam marketing, which can damage the site. The recommended ways:
- Write guest posts. Write articles for other sites related to the brand, and ask for a dofollow link back to yours.
- Directory submission. Submit the site to a quality web directory (an online catalogue that collects and files site URLs by category) that permits dofollow links.
- Build relationships with creators. Contact creators and influencers in the same field to promote the site. Where anything of value changes hands, the link has to carry rel=”sponsored” under Google’s rules, so treat this as a brand-awareness channel rather than a dofollow source.
- Use backlink tools. Use tools to find sites open to backlinks and ask for their cooperation.
What To Watch When Building Dofollow Links
- Avoid buying and selling backlinks. Trading backlinks breaks the search engines’ rules and can get the site penalised.
- Quality over quantity. Many dofollow links from poor-quality sites do SEO no good.
- Build backlinks naturally. Backlinks should accumulate naturally, never in large numbers over a short period.
If hunting for dofollow links yourself is wearing, let Primal take it on. We are an SEO agency that ranks sites on the first page, with a specialist team ready to build strong backlinks for your site. Speak with our SEO team today.
Frequently Asked Questions About Dofollow Links (FAQs)
| Question | Answer |
|---|---|
| How do I check whether a link is dofollow or nofollow? | Right-click the link, choose Inspect, and look at the anchor tag. If the rel attribute contains “nofollow”, “sponsored” or “ugc”, the link is not dofollow. If there is no real attribute, or it holds only values such as “noopener”, the link is dofollow. Browser extensions can highlight nofollow links across a page automatically. |
| Do nofollow links help SEO at all? | Indirectly, yes. Google has treated nofollow as a hint rather than a directive since 2019, so it may count some nofollow links, and they still bring referral visits, brand mentions and a natural-looking link profile. They do not pass authority the way dofollow links do. |
| How many dofollow backlinks does a page need to rank? | There is no fixed number. A page needs enough authority to match the pages already ranking for the keyword, which for a low-competition term may be a handful of relevant links and for a competitive commercial term may be hundreds from strong domains. Relevance and the linking site’s authority matter more than the count. |
| Is buying dofollow links against Google’s rules? | Yes. Google’s spam policies treat links bought or sold to pass ranking signals as link spam, and a site caught doing it can be demoted or removed from results. Paid placements are allowed only when the link carries rel=”sponsored” or rel=”nofollow”, which stops it passing authority. |
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