Apprendre
Nofollow, Sponsored and UGC: Choose the Right Link Attribute
Link attributes describe why a link exists. Sponsored is for compensation, UGC is for user contributions, and nofollow is the fallback when you do not endorse a link.
Lancez un audit DomainLens frais et utilisez le rapport comme liste de priorités.
Choose the value from the relationship
| Situation | Attribute | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| Advertisement, affiliate, paid placement | sponsored | Compensation influenced the link |
| Forum post or public comment | ugc | A user supplied the content |
| Untrusted/unendorsed reference | nofollow | Publisher does not want normal endorsement |
| Editorial citation you trust | No special value | Ordinary links are appropriate |
| Paid link inside user content | ugc sponsored | Both relationships apply |
<a href="https://partner.example/deal" rel="sponsored">Partner offer</a>
<a href="https://example.net/profile" rel="ugc nofollow">Member profile</a>What these attributes do not do
- They do not prevent a linked page from being crawled or indexed through other discovery paths.
- They do not hide the link or make an unsafe URL safe for users.
- They do not replace noopener protections when opening an untrusted page in a new tab.
- They are not a tool for sculpting internal authority by marking ordinary navigation nofollow.
- They do not legalize an undisclosed paid relationship; disclosure obligations are separate.
Audit by link source, not one URL at a time
A site-wide rule that adds nofollow to every external link destroys useful distinctions. Conversely, relying on editors to remember sponsored on every affiliate link makes compliance fragile. Encode stable relationships in components.
- 1Inventory outbound links from templates, editorial content, comments, profiles, widgets, and affiliate systems.
- 2Classify how each source is created and whether money, goods, access, or user input influences it.
- 3Apply the attribute in the component or sanitizer that owns that source.
- 4Preserve valid combinations when HTML is sanitized or rewritten by the CMS.
- 5Sample rendered pages and inspect rel tokens; test new and old content.
Internal-link edge cases
Keep normal internal navigation followable. For login, cart, account, and filter controls, design finite crawlable URLs and access/index policies instead of spraying nofollow. If a URL should not be indexed, noindex or authentication addresses that goal; if it should not exist as a crawlable state, change the link/URL design.
Use DomainLens to find patterns
DomainLens reports link attributes and internal/external link findings for the audited URL. Use representative templates to confirm whether affiliate, comment, and editorial components emit the intended values. Audit ordinary internal navigation separately with the internal linking strategy guide .