So historically, if you wanted to link to another website, but you do not want to share search authority with that website, the “nofollow” tag was the solution. Google’s guidelines also suggested that paid or sponsored links be marked similarly, with a rel=”nofollow” tag applied. 

In 2019 Google released additional details for handling sponsored and user-generated content links, including the option to use rel=”sponsored” on sponsored links on your website. However, these details were noted as optional, with Google stating it was still perfectly acceptable to use rel=”nofollow” instead of rel=”sponsored” for sponsored links on the website. 

That meant that Google was evolving its approach to sponsored links, and “nofollow” was the minimum needed now for the treatment of sponsored links. 

How Recent Algorithm Updates are Impacting Sponsored Content

Now, I didn’t just decide out of the blue to dive deep into “nofollow” attributes and spin up a blog post about it. Over the last 3-4 months, more than a few publishers asked about sponsored content or saw drops in search traffic to high-traffic sponsored articles and generally saw negative search traffic impacts after the Google May Core Update and July “Helpful” algorithm update. 

Interestingly, each of these publishers had an interesting common thread–recent success with sponsored content agencies (producing content like “CBD for Dogs”, “CBD for Pain”, “Meal Replacement Shakes” and “Appetite Suppressants” and other semi-trustworthy seeming articles aimed to address health issues and ailments). In most cases, these content pieces drove huge amounts of search traffic as they had been SEO optimized to the nines and served precise keywords. They also popped on established content-heavy websites with search authority. Essentially, advertisers are buying perfectly optimized articles on the topic of their choice and placing it on websites with established reputations, driving rapid search traffic and sending that authority to the websites of their choice. 

Updating Sponsored Content For SEO

A well-optimized piece of sponsored content is not a bad thing if handled correctly (including the use of rel=”nofollow” or rel=”sponsored” tags on any paid or sponsored links) and assuming it is not representing a disproportionate amount of your search traffic. I suspect that Google reinforced previously released guidelines around sponsored content in the May or July update. In addition, with each update, Google consistently supports E-A-T as its guiding principle (that’s Expertise, Authority, and Trustworthiness). Therefore, it makes perfect sense that not handling sponsored links in line with long-standing advice from Google would impact website authority and, thus, search traffic. 

If you are hosting high-traffic sponsored content on your website and are not including rel=”nofollow” or rel=”sponsored” tags, start including those now. Prioritize links on sponsored content posts that drive more than 1% of your search traffic. This change should not impact the search visibility of the content itself but should ensure that you aren’t vouching for these websites either. 

If you or someone you know is struggling with the impact of a recent Google algorithm update, let them know they can reach out to TFD for support.