: Should I add "rel="nofollow" to editorial, non-sponsored links to commercial websites? We have a news website and, sometimes, we mention companies that we cover and include a link to their sites

@Heady270

The only two reasons to use nofollow on external links are:


A user submitted link that has not been reviewed. The link could be spam, or even if it is on-topic, possibly self promotion. In theory this discourages spammers because it removed the benefit of gaining search engine rankings by spamming your site.
A link is sponsored, paid, or reciprocal. Google requires you do use nofollow on links you put on your site because you get a benefit from the link recipient. Omitting nofollow on sponsored links can get your site penalized by Google which will hurt your rankings.


There is no reason to use nofollow on other types of links. External links to on-topic, non-sponsor, editorial chosen, commercial sites are fine.

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@Angela700

"Nofollow" provides a way for webmasters to tell search engines "Don't follow links on this page" or "Don't follow this specific link."

So, you can do as you pleased. It's ok to have link from companies that you cover in your articles.

Typical use cases include links created by 3rd party commenters on blogs, or links the author wishes to point to, but avoid endorsing, and when it comes to google, a link from one site to another site is a ‘vote’ for the website that has the link pointing to it.

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@Welton855

No, these would be considered natural editorial links and thus its perfectly reasonable to pass 'link equity' to these sites.

Some sites do apply nofollow to all links, but personally i dont think this is a good idea, as it may inhibit companies from working with you on editorial pieces.

The reason nofollow is applied to paid / sponsored content, is a publisher is not meant to sell links that pass 'link equity' so by adding nofollow you can still publish sponsored content and charge a fee for it, but you should not be selling reputation / link equity

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