How To Spot Do-Follow Links On CommentLuv Blogs
Many people automatically assume that a CommentLuv enabled blog will automatically get you a do-follow link. This is not the case at all and if you are anything like me, you will want to spend your time productively. There’s a handy tool called Firebug, that will weed out those do-follow links on CommentLuv blogs and save you wasting your valuable time.
Click The Image To Get Firebug Now
Firebug is a simple add-on for the FireFox web browser. You can download both from the preceding links but you must download the FireFox web browser first.
Once installed Firebug sits in the background of your web browser. It allows you to inspect any element of a web page and see it in it’s code format. Simply by right clicking and choosing inspect element with Firebug, you can analyse every element from whether an image has an alt tag, to whether a link is do follow. So not only is it great for digging out those do-follow links on CommentLuv blogs but it’s a good all round SEO and developer tool.
I find it especially useful when making changes to a WordPress theme or any website that I am unfamiliar with. It allows me to identify the various elements and quickly find them in the theme or template code.
Getting back to finding our do-follow links, here’s how it’s done:-
Scrol down to the existing comments on the blog that you are thinking of commenting on. Right click on one of the commentators links and click inspect element with Firebug from the menu that appears. A pane will open in the bottom of your browser like the one shown in the image below.
As you can see, Firebug has several options and you can even make test changes to the code on the page. The text that is highlighted in blue is the element that I right clicked. In this case a link on one of my comments. You can also use it in reverse and run your mouse over the code. Doing so will highlight the elements of code on the page. How good is that?
Below is a closer look at the code for the link that I right clicked on. What you are looking for is the phrase rel=”no-follow”, or the word no-follow in any way shape or form. As you can see, it is not present in the code below, so this blog is worthy of my time and trouble.
Now before I upset a whole load of bloggers, it’s not all about do-follow links. If a blog is popular and has loads of traffic, it may still be well worth your time. Traffic comes from blogs as well as links and you can build great friendships and ties through blogging. You can tell if a blog has a high level of traffic from its Alexa rank but that’s another post.
About Steve Hippel
+Steve Hippel is into web design SEO and web marketing. He specialises in helping SME's get more from there websites and online marketing efforts. View all posts by Steve Hippel →53 Responses to How To Spot Do-Follow Links On CommentLuv Blogs
Leave a Reply
Kate Brown Wilson (9)
Adrienne (8)
Barry Wells (8)
Leora Wenger (7)
Amit@WordPress We... (5)
Bill Murney @ Wal... (5)
Marloes de Jong (5)
Bill Murney @ Sma... (4)
Nice tip. I also like using Google Chromes built in “Inspect Element”.
Troy Jaggard recently posted..13 Best Premium WordPress Themes for 2012
It’s funny how we get set in our ways Troy.
I use Chrome for personal browsing and Firefox for SEO and developer work. Got to confess, I use Chrome in its barest form for speed and didn’t even know that it had inspect element built in.
Thank’s for sharing that one.
Steve Hippel recently posted..WordPress Plugins For SEO
While Firebug offers a lot more, there’s another handy tool that many bloggers might prefer, Steve, as it’s a much lesser burden on their resources. Quirk SearchStatus is a small add-on that offers a number of functions, one of which is the automatic highlighting of nofollow links on any page visited. Saves some time and is hardly even noticed if your system is already burdened.
Doc Sheldon recently posted..We Have a Dream… and You’re in It!
Hi Doc.
Yes I have used it in the past and completely forgot about it. It’s still firebug for me though because I love all the functions that are available. It’s really usefull for me when doing design/development work.
To be honest, I only use FireFox for work and I use the bare bones version of Chrome for personal browsing. It’s much faster.
That is really good advice though Doc for those that simply want to find the do-follow links and nothing more.
Thank’s for sharing and why didn’t I think of that, DOH!
Still it’s always good to have plenty of choice and now my readers have a little more.
Steve Hippel recently posted..An Overview Of SEO For Small Local Businesses
I agree, Steve. I use both Firebug and Web Developer on FireFox for work, but it is slow, compared to Chrome. Maybe if I got rid of a half dozen or so add-ons, eh?
Doc Sheldon recently posted..We Have a Dream… and You’re in It!
I know that feeling Doc. I have a fair list of add-ons on FireFox but I just can’t do without them or is it more a case of, I won’t? lol.
Steve Hippel recently posted..Get Some links And Get Your Website Indexed
Hi Steve
I have just gone through the first section of your tutorial, Local Biz Domination and there is some great information there. Most of it I was aware of but some was new to me, so thanks for that.
A lot of these so called ‘gurus’ are selling that kind of information for a lot of dollars, surely you could creat a great ebook from all your posts – perhaps you have this in mind. I am thinking of the Internet Marketing field here not just small businesses.
I am probably telling grandmother how to suck eggs here but I am so used to seeing this kind of information sold that I can’t believe you are offering it free without even building a list.
Bill
Bill Murney@Walks In Tameside recently posted..The West Highland Way
Hi Bill.
Thank’s for the complement. It’s funny, I was just replying to your email and in it I mentioned my member site that I’m building http://smallbusinesswebsiteclub.com/
That’s going to be a complete video tutorial and the list building is just around the corner.
I don’t know if you realise Bill but this blog is only a few months old and I just haven’t got round to doing all that I need to yet.
I do share quite a bit here but I have a few tricks up my sleeve that I won’t make common knowledge.
I will get over to your place for a read and a comment soon Bill but at the moment, I’m coding a members area, writing software for automated payments and membership, running this blog, doing SEO for clients and time is short. Hence why I’m sitting here on a Saturday.
Glad you’re finding my tutorial useful. Have sent you an email with some idea’s for your own SEO.
Thank’s again Bill, I value your input.
Steve Hippel recently posted..Getting Backlinks From Blog Commenting
Hi Steve
Just an update on your tutorial, section 2 read and absorbed, section 3 next. I didn’t realise your blog was rather new, you have certainly put some information on it in a few months.
Again I picked up some great tips and while my wordpress plugins were 95% optimised, they did need a little tweaking especially on All In One SEO.
Another part of SEO I was missing out on was putting keywords on images, that will now be corrected. I noticed in one of your ‘Rants’ posts that you mentioned DMOZ, I applied a week ago so it will be interesting to see what happens there.
What’s your opinion on Social Monkee for building backlinks Steve, it has been recommended to me but does it work effectively?
Finally if you want a testimonial for your forthcoming video tutorial, I would be happy to oblige.
Bill
Bill Murney from ‘Walks In Tameside’ recently posted..Walks In Tameside – A Winter Walk Around Hartshead
Hi Bill.
I really pleased that you are finding value in my tutorial. It makes all the hard work worthwhile when I hear that.
It’s really kind of you to offer a testimonial and something that I will take you up on for sure. If you could email me something over, I would be very grateful. The video course is comming together. I checked yesterday and the site is front page of Google in UK, US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, France Germany and a couple more so that’s good news for a new site. Will be giving my blogging buddies advanced notice on pre-launch to give those who have supported me a headstart. Many affiliate tools etc to share if you would like to promote it.
I must admit, I haven’t used social monkee. If it’s some kind of paid automated link building software or service, my experience says that very few are worth the investment.
I personally do use IM Automater which is cheap and merits the tiny monthly cost but even so I have a very specific use for it.
While we are on the subject, I will spill the beans on one of my dirty little secrets (just this once).
I use IM Automator to get backlinks to my blog post each time I post one because it takes just a few seconds to get 10-15 links over a 15 day period. Obvious enough, right.
The thing that I do that many do not is use it to get links to my inbound links. Almost all blogs that I post a comment on, I re-visit. If my comment is approved, I drop the url into IM Automator and get 10-15 backlinks to the blog post. That little extra juice then gets carried back to my post through the link in my comment.
So there you go, one of my dirty tricks is now in the public domain and all because you’re a nice fellow Bill. lol.
There’s a post about IM Automator on the blog Bill. Just search it out with the seach field in the top right of the page.
P.S. I’m not an affiliate to it, so you can rest assured my advice is genuine.
Hi again Steve
I have been through all your tutorials now and I am very impressed with all the terrific information in them. I think your new site is going to be a winner and although my own site is not IM related and your product will probably have limited interest to my readers I would certainly like to give the affiliate programme a chance.
I will sort out a testimonial for you Steve and email it across.
As regards the link building sites, I did use IM Automator for a short period before it became a paid version. Social Monkee has also a free version as well as the pro version and I have started using it as well, whether it is any good or not time will tell.
That’s another great tip about getting backlinks to your post comments, I must use that one.
Bill
Hi Bill.
Unfortunately it will be a little while before I continue adding posts to the tutorial. I’m affraid the video course is eating my time at the moment. Those videos and all the editing take quite a while to do and there will be many of them.
I would be really greatful if you could let me know how you get on with Social Monkee. I think I’ll look it out and possibly give it a go. Anything that saves time and helps SEO is a winner in my book. If it’s as quick and easy as IM Automator, I can double my efforts.
Thank’s for all your positive feedback on the tutorial. Hope it helps you out Bill.
Will get in touch when I’m closer to launching the new site. I have a lot of tips to share with you about getting the best out of promoting it.
Steve Hippel recently posted..Working With WordPress Widgets – Sidebars
There’s just a lot of good add-ons for Firefox that you would want to keep a lot of them, but you really have to let go of some because it slows you down. It’s just like what Doc Sheldon said. Anyway, before I got used to the add-ons for checking do-follow links, I manually checked them by selecting the anchor text, right clicking, viewing the selection source, and looking at the code.
Hi Gerald.
Yes I agree, it does slow things down if you have too many. I find SEO Doctor and Firebug very useful for development work though, hence why I keep them and use Chrome for personal browsing.
I also use Internet Explorer but only when I feel like getting really frustrated and want to see websites as they shouldn’t look. lol.
Steve Hippel recently posted..SEO Link Monster – Automated Link Building Software
Hi Steve! Yes, having too many add ons really slows down my browser. FireFox have lots of useful add Ons but I am more comfortable in using Chrome.
Dave recently posted..Facetime conference call
Hi Dave.
I Know that there are also plenty of add-ons for Chrome too but I like to keep one lean browser for my personal use. How about you?
Thak’s for visiting and sharing your thoughts.
Steve Hippel recently posted..Recommended Pages For A Business Website
This seems to be a nice way to get to know a do follow blog. Thanks for sharing!
Annie @ songs indian recently posted..Songs Indian
Hi Annie.
Looks like this is your first visit here, Thank’s for visiting and taking the time to share your views.
Hi Steve,
Due to my digging on the internet I came across your blog and I’m truly gald with that.
And the tool you’re sharing here in this post
is all new to me,but guess what I think it will help me a lot.
Thanks for sharing you really helped me out.
Sandy
Sandy Maudet recently posted..How to Use Free Screen Capture Tool Called Jing
Hi Sandy.
I’m also glad you stumbled on my blog and even more so that you found something of value to you.
Firebug is a very handy add-on for FireFox. It can slow things down a little, as you will see from the other comments. If you do a bit of development work, it really is useful despite the overhead.
Hope you can make it back here soon. Thank’s for your comment.
Using the SEO for Chrome plug-in gives a nice simple red box around page elements which are no-follow. Even faster than looking at code with Firebug!
Hi Jeff.
Thank’s for your input. I think that will be handy advice for those the do not want to use the design/developer elements of Firebug.
I did use the Chrome plugin for a short while and it gives quite a bit of SEO information. i do have quite a few stand aloan tools for that though.
As I said in a few other comments, I like to keep Chrome clean and lean for my personal browsing.
Maybe I’m getting old and set in my ways but I do prefer FireFox for my work Chrome for home.
Steve Hippel recently posted..Working With WordPress Widgets – Sidebars
Yeah, I gotcha. I will say it only adds a small button to your browser (as you know since you’ve used it), not a toolbar. But,whatever works for you
Hi again Jeff.
Great to see you back. I’m grateful for your comment because it gives other readers a wider choice and the ability to choose the add-on that’s best for their own personal needs. I’m sure you will agree that it’s always good to have a broad range of choices and opinions, especially when it comes to SEO.
Hey Steve,
Thanks a lot for the tips and the plug in. It sounds like the firebug plugin could come in very useful for a variety of things including making changes to a personal blog or web page.
I’m new to your blog, but will be back often as your content looks very helpful.
Thanks Steve,
~Jeremy
Jeremy Ruggles @ Internet Marketing Tips recently posted..Enough about me – How do YOU make money online?
Hi Jeremy
You are very welcome and I’m glad you found this post helpful.
Also glad that you found your way here and even more so that you plan to return. I see your into Internet marketing. That’s great because I’m in the process of putting a product together that might be right up your street, if you’re looking for products to promote that is.
Thank’s for coming by and for leaving a comment. Hope to see you back here soon.
Disclaimer: I’m not a affiliate of this plug-in.
I have been using Quirk SearchStatus. I love it. I LOVE IT! Not only does it highlight no follow links in pink but it also has a auto page rank bar. I can’t tell you how many times I use it in a day. Just out of curiosity sometimes I click on a link and then check out its page rank. (its so funny when Google drops its own ranking)
The highlight of the no follow tags is another HUGE time saver. There are a lot of sites that say do follow but are not. Or…their do follow link is a arbitrary pic. It’s soooooo annoying to spend 30 minutes typing up a excellent comment and finding out your groomed dog just got neutered. Of course it got approved fast, it was a great comment but then finding out they cut your link after advertising do follow is like working and then getting told your not getting paid. But of course your production is still used. Annoying…
Anyway…I’ll check out firebug. I like a easy way to look under the hood.
Hello Jeremy.
That sounds like a pretty cool plugin and you clearly love it (lol).
It’s great that so many readers have shared a wealth of other options on this post and your contribution is greatfully received.
Go check out Firebug because if you don’t use it for spotting those do-follow links, you will find it has many useful features.
Thank’s for your input and sharing what looks like another great tool with other readers of this post.
Hi Steve
Ive been using the ‘No Do Follow’ tool in firefox, highlights do-follow links in blue and no-follow in pink.
You mention in the first paragraph of the article that weeding out the do-follow links will save you a lot of time, I was under the impression that gaining a fair amount of no-follow links was also very important, making it natural in google, and helping your SERPS position. I also read somewhere that no-follow links do carry some weight if on a page with high PR and not to many outbound links etc etc, whats your take on this?
Thanks
James.
James@iRobot recently posted..Roomba Review
Hi James.
You are absolutely right, no-follow links do have some value and you should mix things up for link diversity. High traffic blogs bring traffic even if the links are no-follow.
My personal feeling is that commentluv and keywordluv enabled blogs carry extra benefit. For me ,it’s all about managing my time. I take my time to ensure that I’m engaging with the author and users on these valuable blogs. If I’m taking my time I want better links, i.e, targeted keywords in my anchor and keywords in my comment text (where practical). Two links from commentluv, keywords from keywordluv and do-follow wherever possible.
For diversity and a good mix of no-follow links, I often outsource. You can buy a bunch of less valuable links for next to nothing. For me it’s about using my own time to get valuable targeted links and leveraging other peoples time to bulk up the numbers with a diverse range of links.
Always keep in mind that one targeted, high PR link is worth many PR N/A or zero links and many, many more no-follow links.
Using my time productively and outsourcing the less productive is just the way I like to do things. It’s not the only way or even the right way but there are a lot of advantages for me, in terms of saving time.
Thanks for the valuable lesson that you have shared Steve these are very useful plug-in that I can use to add it in my blog. at first I really don’t know anything about this all I know is by using the Firefox add-on called do-follow is the only tool we can use to detect do-follow links.
Kate Brown Wilson recently posted..Fab Defense
You are very welcome Kate. If you only need to find do-foolow links, then you might do better to carry on with the plugin that you are using. If you want much more functionality then Firebug is a good choice.
I really appreciate this advice and tips you have shared Steve, well I guess I should stick to my plug-in that I use to find do-follow links. thanks again.
Kate Brown Wilson recently posted..פסח
You’re very welcome Kate.
I very appreciate your help Steve about regarding doffolow links. I am new in the Internet Marketing`s world and this is great post. It is very important for us beginners. All the best!
Erwin@BeybladeBattle recently posted..BEYBLADE METAL FUSION FIGHT- LIST OF BEYBLADE TOYS PARTS
Thank’s Erwin.
Glad you found this post helpful. There’s plenty more free info around the blog. It’s great that you’re giving Internet marketing a go. If I could offer one piece of advice, it’s don’t give up. A lot of people do but if you just keep going it will all come together.
Hi Steve,
Its my first visit at your site and I found it very informative and interesting. And the most important, you reply every comment with very joyously. I appreciate both your writing and knowledge. Thanks for sharing this informative post.
Hi Roberta.
Thank’s for your feedback. I’m glad you are finding some value in my posts.
I believe that if someone takes the time to leave a comment, it’s just polite to take the time to reply. I have made many new friends and allies online doing this.
Hello,
Nice tip Steave. I’m using Google chrome’s seonuke addon, it simply underline all nofollow links.
neojit recently posted..WordPress Newspaper and Magazine Themes | WordPress Newspaper and Magazine Themes 2012
Hi Neojit.
That’s another good one. This post now has a good selection of tools to choose from thank’s to the commenters.
There was a beautiful add-on for Firefox called Nodofollow which would highlight the nofollow and dofollow links on a page in different colors. Unfortunately, they discontinued it with Firefox 4.0. The other addons (so called SEO addons) out there may not be as reliable.
Firebug route is a bit roundabout though there’s no other easy way at the moment I guess.
Ajith Edassery recently posted..Google Analytics Bounce Rate
Hello Ajith
I think I remember this addon. I’m sure I used it a few years ago, when I had my first brush with I.M. As mentioned above by several people, Firebug is a bit more round about and carries a bit of an overhead.
Personally, I like this one because it has many more features that allow you to dig deeper into the make up of a web page. This is really valuable when you are looking at competing pages. Also when looking at your own page from the browsers and search engines point of view.
Steve, I try to do the same thing that you do as far as using Firefox when I’m coding and building sites. My default browser is Chrome for everything else. I already use Firebug but I picked up on the tip that I found in your comment section about using the SEO for Chrome plugin and I just installed it. Thanks!
Sherryl Perry @keepupweb internet strategy recently posted..The Rise of the Cyber Cold War
Hi Sherryl.
I have taken the decision to be really strict about keeping Chrome clean and lean for personal use. I did install SEO for Chrome several months ago but I no longer use it. With the exception of using it to test how a site displays, Chrome is for me and me only. lol.
While we are here Sherryl, I just thought I would apologise that I haven’t been around much lately. I think I mentioned that I’m working on a product at the moment. It’s been consuming all of my time lately. I haven’t posted for a couple of weeks, so I better take time out soon.
Great to see you here. Will be over to yours soon (I promise).
Hi Steve,
There are a lot of useful tools, ex. SearchStatus. But the problem is all this research you have to do manual. Do you know how to find the do-follow blogs in more “intelligent” way?
Thanks an advance.
Hi Dimitry.
I personally think that the keyword research should be done manually. A piece of software cannot understand a business, it’s clients, how and what they search for and put this all together into an SEO plan.
There are tools that make it a lot easier though. Tools like Traffic Travis can simplify research as well as help with on page and off page SEO.
Hey Steve,
Thanks for sharing details about Firebug add-on. I use slight tweaking of user stylesheets in Firefox web browser, to render all NoFollow links with a different highlight color. This separates NoFollow links from DoFollow ones and saves quite a lot of time figuring this out. Plus unlike any add-ons it does not impact the browser speed. You just need to put the following code in the stylesheet you select:
a[rel~=nofollow] {
background-color: pink !important;
color: black !important;
font-weight: normal !important;
text-decoration: underline !important;
}
This works great for me.
Sarah Reece recently posted..Bluehost Coupon
Hi Sarah.
That’s a really simple and good way to find the do-follow links on a web page. The add-ons and plugin’s that I use, do impact on FireFox’s speed. As I mentioned, I only use FireFox for work so it’s not the end of the world. I would miss all of the other functionality that Firebug offers if I gave it up. For those that just want to separate do-follow and no-follow links, that’s a great tip.
Thank’s for sharing both the concept and the code.
I never heard of Firebug before, so this is an eye-opener for me. THanks for the valuable info you shared!
Paula recently posted..cheap womens scrubs
Hi Paula
There’s always something new to be discovered from reading blogs. I know there are easier ways to spot do-follow blogs but Firebug has a lot of useful additions.
Glad you had the time to drop by and greatful that you took the time to share your thoughts.
Thanks Steve.
The NoDoFollow plug in for Firefox is also a very useful tool for this job. It’s easy to use and unobtrusive.
Hi Mark.
You’re very welcome. Firebug is a great tool for web designers and SEO’s but on reflection, I should have pointed out some of the more simple alternatives. Fortunately a lot of you guys have done that for me so thank’s for sharing.
You’re welcome.