Link Attributes (Nofollow, Sponsored, UGC)
The HTML link attributes rel="nofollow", rel="sponsored" and rel="ugc" describe the relationship to a linked target and, since Google's 2019/2020 update, replace the blanket nofollow that was previously the only option. rel="sponsored" marks paid links and advertising placements, rel="ugc" identifies user-generated links in comments or forums, and rel="nofollow" remains the general value for all other cases without an editorial endorsement. Google treats all three values as hints rather than strict directives: the attributes do not necessarily exclude a link from crawling and evaluation, but feed in as additional context for how Google classifies it.
In practice
Paid collaborations, advertorials and affiliate links should consistently carry rel="sponsored", because Google explicitly prefers this marking over the generic nofollow. Comment functions, forums and guest books on your own website should add rel="ugc" to automatically generated links, although particularly trustworthy regular users can be linked without the attribute in individual cases. The values can be combined, for example as rel="ugc nofollow", which is already standard in many CMS and forum plugins. Unlike the backlink, which describes an incoming link from someone else's site, and the anchor text, which concerns the link text, these attributes govern the technical qualification of outgoing links from your own website. For Austrian SME websites it is worth reviewing the CMS and blog comments. The important distinction: rel="sponsored" is a purely technical statement for search engines and does not replace advertising labelling that is visible to readers. Whether and how a paid collaboration has to be labelled follows from media and competition law requirements – in Austria above all section 26 of the Mediengesetz and the UWG.