Rel attribute to have both author and nofollow

You would normally want Google to follow the rel=”author” link – because the link is an internal link from a post/page to the author page.

Why would you want to nofollow these links on your site?

(The target of the link is neither a paid link, nor an untrusted link, nor a login/protected link, which are the usual reasons for using nofollow)

Hi Russell

The target of the link is neither a paid link, nor an untrusted link, nor a login/protected link, which are the usual reasons for using nofollow

My site authors are not moderated so may well enter untrusted or paid links. This is the reason I need the nofollow on these links.

I don’t actually believe it can be done. You may know better though. Hope you can help.

What user level are your site authors? You can set up AuthorSure to nofollow or strip links entirely based on the level of the user (contributor, author, editor, administrator, etc)

The problem isn’t adding nofollow or stripping links. The problem is more to do with Google not recognising authorship when the two values are used together e.g rel="author nofollow"

If Google obeys the “nofollow” directive then it will not follow the link and hence ignore the author bit too

Right? So you can’t have both author and no follow together? What would you do in a case where your post authors were general public? i.e i have open site registration with default sign up role set to author.

Note: I’ve changed my username so am posting here with my new one ??

What I am saying is that I do not understand your intent of “author nofollow”.

Why do you not want Google to follow the internal links on the site from the posts/pages to the author archive pages?

Do you want your author’s to have Google AuthorShip but not want that their author pages to be indexed on your site?

If so, then noindex,nofollow the author archive pages?

Hi Russell,

Thanks for your reply.

Why do you not want Google to follow the internal links on the site from the posts/pages to the author archive pages?

The author links on my posts don’t point to my author archive pages. The author links point to whereever the blog post author wants them to point (I have a set up a field where they can enter their own link which may point to their homepage elsewhere on the web, or perhaps their Twitter page, or their favourite cooking website – basically anywhere they want).

Giving my blog post authors this freedom to enter their own URL comes at a cost. I cannot vouch for the links they enter because I don’t personally know the person (I have open registration so for all I know they could be linking to an unrepeatable website that I very much disapprove of). So, my aim is to tell Google don’t follow these links because I have no idea where they lead to – and do not want to vouch for them. At the same time, I’d like my blog post authors to benefit from Google Authorship.

So, my issue is I need to use rel=”nofollow author”. But when I use these together, Google Authorship doesn’t work.

Hi Henry,

That makes sense however I think there is a better way of achieving the flexibility your require, implementing Google AuthorShip and having better SEO by NOT losing the link juice off the site by allowing links in the author boxes on individual posts and pages.

If you disallow links in the author boxes than you will implement the standard rel=author link from the posts to the author archives. This keeps link juice on the web site.

Then on the author pages you allow an AuthorSure Extended Bio. This gives the author the flexibility to add images, videos and any links they like. However you can automatically set these links as nofollow.

The author gets Google Authorship, an opportunity to promote themselves and have full flexibility to add links so they are happy.

You are able to set these links to nofollow automatically so you retain control with a single click. It also keeps the posts/pages on topic without any irrelevant links on the page.

So everyone wins! Will that work for you?

… on the author pages you allow an AuthorSure Extended Bio. This gives the author the flexibility to add images, videos and any links they like. However you can automatically set these links as nofollow.

Hi Russell, really appreciate your suggestion – I think this *could* work only wouldn’t putting a nofollow on this particular link cause Google Authorship to stop working? That’s the issue you see – when the link back to Google+ (https://plus.google.com/...) has a nofollow on it, Google throws their toys out of the pram and authorship doesn’t work i.e. my user’s profile picture isn’t shown in Google search results etc etc. It is this link back to Google that I cannot vouch for (because how do I know my blog post authors are entering their Google + URL?). For all I know they could enter a link to an unreputable website. It is this link I can’t vouch for.

Or do you mean putting rel="me nofollow" on links to Google+ (from my author archive page) would work?

Just to add – doing rel="author nofollow" doesn’t.

Only links in the Extended bio can be set as nofollow.

The Google Plus Profile link is NOT in the Extended Bio and is a followed link so Google AuthorShip works fine.

This Google+ URL is filled in on the “Your Profile” page of each author.

All that is missing is for AuthorSure to validate that any link in the “Google+” field really starts with “https://plus.google.com/”

This would work for you?

Right! I think i’m following you now and am on track now. Again, really appreciate your help with this ??

In the next release of AuthorSure I will add the validation of Google+ links in Your Profile to prevent your contributor putting non Google links in that field. In fact I will validate all the profile links, Twitter, Facebook, etc)

The links between the the posts/pages and the author archive pages are rel=”author” and are followed.

The profile (Google+, Twitter, Facebook. etc) links between the author archive page and the external profiles are rel=”me” and are followed.

Any links in the Extended Bio can be set up automatically as rel=”nofollow”

Thanks Russell!

The profile (Google+, Twitter, Facebook. etc) links between the author archive page and the external profiles are rel=”me” and are followed.

Here you can also do rel="me nofollow" – I just tested it out and authorship continues to work. i.e I can still see member’s faces in the rich snippet testing tool ??

https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets