Image credits, do follow or no follow

[Jamie101]

Working on a new site which uses quite a lot of images, is it better to make the image credits all do follow or no follow?

Nearly sure the answer is no follow but no harm in asking.

 

[murph]

No follow!

 

[alex]

No follow!

Maybe, but not by rule of thumb surely?

I've spoken to quite a few people about this over the past year as we require image credits for our images, in fact it's a legal requirement in Germany.

Google suggests when to nofollow (https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/96569?hl=en), such as paid links, untrusted sources, when third parties publish the links etc, but I haven't seen them talk specifically about image credits. I also haven't seen any evidence that suggests that dofollowing them is a bad thing, after all they are a natural reference.

I'd be inclined to say that, aside from it ultimately being the webmaster's decision, dofollowing image credits is actually a good thing. We certainly make use of them on our photography blog as we want to ensure that all our photographers are properly credited for their work.

These are purely my own conclusions though, if you've got any solid evidence to the contrary I'd genuinely like to see it because actually I don't know whether there is a set rule somewhere that I've missed.

 

[tifosi]

Crediting an image is one thing, providing authority through follow links is another. No hard and fast rule for this.

On the whole nofollow, but if somethng is for gratis then there is some leeway. Depends on how pushy they have been in forcing follow for using their stuff! More pushy less inclined to do it!

 

[murph]

From an SEO standpoint I'd say nofollow. Pick and choose authority/relevant themed sites to dofollow.

 

[Blossom]

Generally nofollow, but a couple of things for consideration:

- what the licensing terms of the images are
- whether the site is relevant to yours
- the moral factor

 

[alex]

Fair comments, and I appreciate there are no fast rules.

I guess my standpoint in general is dofollow everything unless there is cause not to. With image credits I see them as natural references, just as I would when quoting the source of an article, and therefore there's no reason to nofollow.

Ultimately up to the site owner, unless of course there are specific terms and conditions attached to the image in which case either follow them and have the image or choose another image.

 

[Jamie101]

Thanks for all your opinions.

In a weird way isn't giving a do follow link for an image nearly like selling a link to someone? It's basically like "Oh, you done me a favour so he's a do follow link".

I've no problem giving a do follow link, don't get me wrong (especially when it's a nice image to use) but I'm just trying to see where Google could come from when looking at this.

 

[Blossom]

Thanks for all your opinions.

In a weird way isn't giving a do follow link for an image nearly like selling a link to someone? It's basically like "Oh, you done me a favour so he's a do follow link".

It's a tough one, because looking at logically whenever you're linking to someone it's basically, 'That's cool, thanks for creating this. Hey you guys, you should totally look at this.'

And guest posting comes under the same concept as image credit. Mutual beneficial exchange, so really it should be ok if there's no money involved.

However, it's muddied by the fact that there are examples of things in this area that are frowned upon - links in widgets and credit links for themes can cause problems, for example.

I think all you can do really is judge it on intention. If you're trying to use it to abuse the system or it looks incredibly unnatural then it's going to raise red flags.

The other option might be to contact the site and ask them what their preference is (or if they're a big site there may be documentation/discussion on it somewhere).

 

[PaulGregory]

I find that often people who give stuff away for free in exchange for a credit don't renew their site (whether it's a domain or a subdomain account somewhere) and so if you're intending dofollow it's worth regularly checking the sites are still what they're supposed to be.

The other thing that would influence my dofollow/nofollow decision is the position of the link. Are you crediting on the page that has the image, or on a separate credits page? And if on the page, is it near the image, or in the footer?