Link Attributes

Attributes have been added to links over the years to combat link spam. Link spam became a problem alongside the popularity of blogs. Blogging software allowed people to leave comments, along with a link to their website, which was great when people would leave legitimate comments and conversation. It was not so great when people and bots posted links to their affiliated pharmaceutical site. This became a significant problem as automated bots left thousands of comments on blogs, attempting to spam the comments with links.

In 2005, Google created the rel=nofollow link attribute to identify untrusted links. (The rel attribute is short for relationship, which discloses the relationships of the link between two websites.) Soon, the nofollow attribute was used as the default link method in nearly all social media and blogging software. The rel=nofollow attribute means that Google will not assign any influence or credit from your site to the linked site. It isn’t a negative signal, but simply that you do not trust the source.

<a href="https://example.com" rel="nofollow></a> 

The second attribute expanded on the nofollow link, as some SEO practitioners attempted to create false relevance by purchasing links on other websites. By purchasing links from a relevant website, they could artificially increase their relevance. However, any time a link is exchanged for money, Google considers the link to be paid advertising. This means that the paid link should be attributed differently from an “organic” or editorial link.

For a paid or sponsored link, rel=sponsored is the preferred method of providing this attribution.

<a href="https://example.com" rel="sponsored">anchortext</a>