Google: Links In Press Releases Should Use Nofollow Like Paid Links

Selected answers from the Dumb SEO Questions Facebook & G+ community.

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  Dave Elliott: I disagree! (well the should part, i'm not sure what really happens) if you are issuing a press release it is absolutely fair enough that a link directly to your website is a follow link. It is also entirely legitimate that the product/service/whatever  ;the subject of your press release is linked to with a follow link.
  
  We tend to do them as full links as in. This is what we are on about (http://www.clients-site.com/the-subject-matter) and The Company (http://www.client-site.com) is blah blah and has been blah blahing for the past 20 years blah. Rather than linking from the keyword / company name though.
  
  Makes it easier for people to rewrite things and means that if things are copied in a weird way(eg into notepad and out again) then the links are retained, also you can never be sure how technologically savy a journo is!
  
  How, is this not fair enough? I can understand Google not wanting to rank the link particularly highly as there may not be much manual checking of these things and a story you have submitted to a general pr site shouldn't be considered a recommendation, but, what about the niche ones, relevant to the industry? Surely it's just the same rules as for web directory sites, rather than a blanket rule covering ALL PR sites.
  
  Manually checked, relevant PR sites Good. automated + general = bad.
  
  I also don't want to start no following in case the story is picked up by  ;news sites/blogs, who simply copy the URL and the no follow from the PR release onto their wonderfully written, unique & relevant piece of content/blog post that is based off my PR site submission, which is surely what you SHOULD be aiming for from doing these things? Am I meant to trust that the bloggers in my  ;industry know enough about HTML to remove the no follow to give me better link juice, or for that matter, actually care enough about my companies SEO to remove the no follow? Cause I really don't, hence why I get to have a job as an SEO/in bound marketer/whatever its called today in the first place.
  
  ........................ and breathe.
• 
  Yasser Mohamed: Well said +Dave Elliott ;
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  Ian Dixon: Always remember that a well-crafted press release is the journalists friend. S/he has copy that they can just drop into a space in the publication with very little work to get things into shape.
  Now then you need to think more about where the press release will go. This is where the problem can start with the wide PR distribution services.
  As an example
  I could do a relevant PR and send it to my 3 local radio stations, 2 local TV channels and 2 local newspapers. I would put dofollow links in for that because if they use it with the links in place then I get a nice backlink from an authority site
  Or I could distribute the same PR through one of the services. Then I would nofollow because I have no clue where the release might end up appearing. That means the site could end up in the bad neighbourhoods which is clearly far removed from my goal.
  Press release distribution services are a tricky one. They can work to get your message out more widely than you could on your own. Yet they can lead to harm and lots of work to clean things up when that hits
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  Yasser Mohamed: Thanks +Ian Dixon I am just tip toeing into the PR world and I am a bit confused - this helps. ; Time to rethink my PR strategy.
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  The Content Factory: It looks pretty accurate to us. Press releases are not the link juice they once were but if they're written and distributed correctly, the pickups can make for great link juice.
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  Tim Capper: I think the general consensus is :
  
  PR submission sites = nofollow
  
  I submitt (like +Ian Dixon ;) to actual companies, press and journalists directly - no submission sites.
  
  When I have a super dooper, megga release.
  
  The Journalist gets a promo item wrapped in a beautiful box, with typed Press release. When the box has been delivered, my email press release gets sent to them later in the day.
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  June M: The other consideration in pr releases is the service its self ; creditable release vs. blog network feeds only. ; Also limit your links in body and long tail seems to be preferred.