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Squidoo, a huge user generated content web site founded by Seth Godin, announced they are now nofollowing all outbound links.
I am surprised it took so long. It was founded in 2005 and has been used by SEOs for years for getting links or content into Google. I believe Squidoo was hit hard after Panda.
That being said, Squidoo said:
Based on the successful implementations of other authoritative sites, like Wikipedia, Squidoo will now apply “nofollow” markup to all outbound links. This means that any link shared on a lens will work exactly as it always has for you and for people visiting Squidoo, but search engines will no longer use it as a signal for ranking.
In 2010, Squidoo had 1.5 million hand-built "lenses" or pages.
There is forum reaction from SEOs at a couple forums including SEOmoz and Warrior Forums, here is one comment:
Not a big surprise. Made me money, served it's purpose, one tool in an arsenal that now is less effective, oh well right?
Forum discussion at SEOmoz and Warrior Forums.
Comments:
Praveen Sharma
04/03/2013 12:56 pm
Good for them.
Josh
04/03/2013 01:29 pm
Meh. I'm 50/50 on this. Sure, it's good to reward good content; however, they /were/ getting exploited. Perhaps users with X articles/lenses would qualify for followed links.
Anti-SEO
04/03/2013 02:39 pm
What a great news. Finally this content farm was caught by Panda (it was not hit before). Seems like Ezinearticles, another well known content farm, was hit by latest Panda (was hit just a bit before). I'm following these websites since first Panda. The fact is, that this is the first time Panda hit monsters of the content farm industry. Now who will post on them, when the main benefit gone ? This news made my day )
Joe Youngblood
04/03/2013 02:49 pm
Took far too long to happen.
DaveKeys
04/03/2013 06:42 pm
I'll take the bifurcated reaction approach here. This is good news and bad news at the same time. Getting quality links is a little bit like a teenager trying to find a job but everyone wants experience. That makes it pretty tough on the teenager. At the same time, you don't want people with fake degrees getting jobs in hospitals, engineering firms, law firms etc. Well, maybe it doesn't matter much in the law firms but you get my drift – the abuse of links by spammers has to be stopped somehow but it's making things tough for websites whose owners have to run a business and don't really have time to enter the entertainment business of social media. It's pretty tough for a funeral director to gin up a happy following on Facebook.
Alan
04/04/2013 01:04 am
Exactly Dave and that is why Google has to eventually forget about links. Because links are a 90's solution but the problem is now a 2013 problem.
Takeshi Young
04/04/2013 01:43 am
They said in their release that "trusted" users may have nofollow removed, whatever that means.
Going Online
04/04/2013 08:56 am
They are back to dofollow, according to http://hq.squidoo.com/squid-news/update-for-changing-link-status-on-squidoo/
Yeye Yates
04/04/2013 09:09 am
Thanks for the info. So basically, for links to mean something from Squidoo is that it has to come from an internal post. Guess have to sign-up with Squidoo - its free and hope that it works well with ColibriTool (http://colibritool.com)
Jawad Latif
04/04/2013 09:25 am
Another door closed for link builders.
Barry Schwartz
04/04/2013 09:39 am
Nope. Only for internal links.
Luke Redding
04/04/2013 10:19 am
Wow. Are people really still using Squidoo lens' for link development anyway?
Treathyl FOX
04/04/2013 05:38 pm
Do follow. No follow. Do follow. Now no follow. It's like - He loves me? He loves me not? You sign up. They say create, add some good links. Now they say the links don't matter cause they don't count for ranking. Whatever! O_o I share links at my Squidoo lenses that I deem to be QUALITY. It’s my ranking system. My lens links are quality links so feel free to add or share them wherever! :)
Louida M
04/05/2013 01:19 pm
I'm a writer on Squidoo and this is good news to me. I'm tired of all the spammers that are basically destroying Squidoo. Squidoo is a great place to write and I believe they'll bounce back after the Google hit.
Helluin
04/05/2013 02:18 pm
People who use Squidoo as a publishing platform for content. We we always there, it's just that the linkbuilding community elbowed its way in and made it harder for our work to be seen. There are many people on the web for whom content is the whole point of the exercise; we just want to write about things we love and earn enough to live on through our writing. If you write in particular niches, build blogs. However, if you write on many different subjects instead of a niche, you have to use third party sites like Squidoo, where there's enough other relevant content to draw traffic via crosslinks and the category tree to your topic. This strategy only works if linkbuilders and spammers don't trash the publishing platforms you pick. I'd nearly given up posting anything there because so much junk was getting posted, but now that they're finally taking out the trash, I feel a little more hopeful. Past time.
thrivingmom
04/05/2013 05:59 pm
As always, I'm agreeing with Greekgeek. :) I use Squidoo to publish my content. It's easier than dealing with my own site and my own advertising management for making money. I don't care about the no follow. I never used Squidoo for backlinks.
johnnny
04/05/2013 06:20 pm
I honestly don't understand the hate for the so-called "content farms". Your average Joe writes on Squidoo or Hubpages, or he writes on Blogger.com or Wordpress.com, what's the difference really?
johnnny
04/05/2013 06:20 pm
"on a case-by-case basis" Sounds like you'd have to make a special request or something.
or zilberman
04/07/2013 05:49 am
Though I do agree with some change that is needed you cannot disregard links all together as they are still a great way to see how good is your content, you cannot go all social as it will be also heavily abused. The problem here is that SEOs are taking the easy way and as every monetized field links are abused hardly. Let's just hope the right way will be found in a way that will not distort all the web
David
04/08/2013 07:51 am
Does not surprise me at all... Prob hit by Panda.And yes people were just spamming it in any case.We all know the drill, the more traffic a sites get's, the more it creates room for spam.At the end of the day with Squidoo it should be about the content and not about a backlink. But I say good for them.1 Less site to be abused by spammers.
Dolly Estrada
04/09/2013 03:36 am
Linked back to your post from Warrior Forum ;) By the way, my links have not been no- followed so far. -> The Warrior that wrote the comment in your post. (Hey it's not every day I get quoted by THE Barry Schwartz, I'll take what I can get!)
Barry Schwartz
04/09/2013 10:09 am
I did link to him and credit him.
R Webster
04/09/2013 01:30 pm
There was definitely a problem with link builders - but there's is also an internal struggle with those who sell lenses that have been artificially inflated via embedding URLs belonging to other writers on Squidoo. Closing the old forum has helped, stopping the transfer of lenses has helped, and now (I feel) Squidoo must protect the rights and work of individual writers (that is, if they want to keep the best people on the site). Squidoo needs to permanently ban about 1/3 of the veteran writers on Squidoo - a loss for the next year or so, but necessary to rebrand themselves. It can be done, the key is that they don't become "too desperate" and lower their standards (or ignore undeniable proof).
Dolly Estrada
04/09/2013 05:47 pm
I know, just wanted to talk to Barry Schwartz :D This is total bragging rights on the WF you know.
Barry Schwartz
04/09/2013 05:48 pm
Had no clue I was that cool. :) and I don't even have google glass yet.
Dolly Estrada
04/09/2013 10:15 pm
"Barry Schwartz: Too Cool for Google Glass". I'll send you the link to the blog post when it's up hehehe Kidding, kidding! Title needs work...
Marviene Vulpes
04/19/2013 04:50 pm
"It's pretty tough for a funeral director to gin up a happy following on Facebook." LOL. So true!
Farfel
04/24/2013 08:02 pm
This is the part where my idol Michael Martinez jumps in and lectures about the inherent evil in generating content for no other reason than to serve some worthless selfish agenda instead of adding quality to the Web for its own sake. To which I say amen. Anybody who is out there chasing back links in this manner is also the same idiot who is telling SEO clients "I'll get you on page one for (insert your URL or company name here)".
Casablanca Hire
06/12/2013 12:58 pm
So what is the difference between someone having a link from squidoo lens to his amazon affiliate link or someone was building backlinks to his website??? Are they both spammers?
Treathyl FOX
10/14/2013 03:54 pm
FYI. No longer publish for Squidoo as of October 2013.