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Do You Use "No Follow" Codes on Your Review and Giveaway Posts?

I kept reading about the fact that bloggers should be using "no follow" codes when writing review and giveaway posts. Finally, I read HOW to do that. So, I thought that I would share it with you.

Instead of using
Company

you would use
rel="nofollow">Company

when linking to the sponsoring company's site.

I think that it is more of a Google issue, than an FTC one, but it never hurts to be aware of such things. Do you use this type of coding already?

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Permalink Reply by Shraddha on November 2, 2009 at 7:28pm

due to new google adjustment everyone's page rank has recently changed.

i checked yours, its down to 3.

you are not alone even famous bloggers like problogger are affected.

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Permalink Reply by kdc521 on November 8, 2009 at 7:46pm

I know! I just checked it. That's so weird that now that I'm making a conscious effort to include the no follow code that it has gone down. It's so arbitrary with no explanations given for why the ranks go up or down, that I can't even focus on it. I'll just keep doing what I know to do now going forward. Que sera, sera.

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Permalink Reply by Shraddha on November 2, 2009 at 7:49pm

there are two types of page ranks..

the real page rank that determines which page should show up on google search is very much there..otherwise how would it be decided which page should show up first?

the one they have stopped is the one that would show up on our google tool bar..it was never accurate anyways...

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Permalink Reply by Tamra Augostino on October 26, 2009 at 11:48am

What if we are doing a review of a product we purchased with our own money? I still do those on occasion if I find a product I love.
How does google know the difference? Should I just use the nofollow on all of the links I use?

I'm so confused about this. Why does google make it so difficult?

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Permalink Reply by Shraddha on November 2, 2009 at 6:33pm

the page rank drop fear is real.
check out this article
http://www.dailyblogtips.com/google-changing-the-pagerank-algorithm/

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Permalink Reply by Jenny on November 8, 2009 at 12:48am

I use no follow all around my blog :D

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Permalink Reply by Karrine (Kay) McFarlane on November 22, 2009 at 2:01pm

I think that if you clearly have a PR and review policy listed on your blog you will be ok as far as the FTC guidelines are concerned. It is a google thing.

However from the perspective of the merchant who offers you the fee or product for a review, having a no follow link defeats the purpose of their marketing campaign. They offer the free merchandise as a way to get their 'brand' out there and a no follow link does not help thier PR with google.

If a blogger had no follow links on I am not sure I would encourage my clients to provide them with free merchandise for reviews or giveaways.

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Permalink Reply by nicole h on November 26, 2009 at 8:58pm

I have to agree with Karrine- if companies can't have the link back to their site, they aren't going to want to send out items for review.

if you read the FTC new guidelines, it does NOT say you can't have the link. The only time you get penalized is if it is the link to BUY the product, ie straight to purchase page. if you only link to the product info page or the company home page, you are not seen as making money from the link. It is when you have say the Amazon Affiliate widget, where you make MONEY off the purchase, that you have to declare the income from those purchases.

As long as you make FULL disclosure that company X gave you XXX to review, and you have a disclosure statement AGAIN at the end stating you were not told how to review product, you are ok. IF it is for a product like face cream, you have to have the disclosure that your results are for you only and may NOT be typical of any other person. As long as you state the non-claim, you are ok.

I'm sure the FCC will change the rules yet again after the new year, but for now, that is all that is needed

as far as google, my page rank has not changed and I do not have the non-follow codes. It depends on whether you focus your blog on page rank or not. Alot of companies are now searching out newer blogs as they have different audience that the same ones that the older blogs have. keep that in mind!

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Permalink Reply by Grissell Barros on December 4, 2009 at 7:09pm

oh I didn't know that.. will get on that the next time.

thanks for the information

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Permalink Reply by Joy on December 17, 2009 at 4:02pm

Wow! Thanks for sharing this. I was completely unaware.

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Permalink Reply by Zipporah Sandler on December 31, 2009 at 8:28pm

Wait - I thought this only affects your Page Rank (which is basically a worthless number). PR and where your blog shows up in google's search are two very different things. My PR is 3, but my blog comes up high on the searches for my keywords. You get higher in the search engines by having quality links to your site. Please correct me if I'm wrong.