Do Google Always Tell You About Penalties?

[Karen_Dauncey]

Hi

One of my clients has recently suffered a big decline in rankings on some of their keywords, going from positions in the top 10 to sub 50 for some of their keywords, but not all. Their website is still indexed and there is no link warning from Google. Some of their links from a previous link builder are dodgy and we have already tried to contact the other company for removal but to no avail.

Any ideas where I start? So far I planning to increase the branded anchor link and add some content as the site is fairly light on content. Is it worth doing a reconsideration request and mention the bad links incase this is the problem. Has anyone seen any particular good resources on what to do when it appears you have a penalty. None of my other clients have been effected by Panda or Penguin and although I have done some general reading I need to know what action to take and get up to speed FAST!

Thanks in advance.

Kind regards

Karen

[MoosaHemani]

Penalty can be limited and i have seen websites that drop its ranking for few keywords or few areas of the website got hit by the update! so its fairly possible!

[Karen_Dauncey]

Thanks so much for taking the time to respond, I saw a decline in traffic on Saturday so likely to be the latest Panda update. I just thought a penalty would result in a penalty for all keyword rankings not just some. I will try the reconsideration request, check out Majestic SEO links and see what happens and build more quality content in the meantime.

Kind regards

Karen

[MoosaHemani]

That right check when the traffic has dropped and then the current changes in the website (if done any) if there is nothing major has been changed on your website and dates where the traffic has been dropped is close to the Panda or Penguin update then you are one of the millions of culprit.

Check your Google webmaster tools and see if you see any link request and if not then you have to get in to doggy links and remove then and tell Google about it...  If you will be way to lucky your website will come up in rankings or otherwise you have to delete as many doggy links as possible and build as many high quality links as possible.

To see your complete link profile try and get the links from Majestic SEO, Google Webmaster Tool or more and if you are good with budget then try and use the Link Removal software to spot and remove as many bad links as possible.

Hope this helps!

[Klarke]

First look at the Analytics, and try to determine when exactly the drop in traffic happened.  If it coincides with a known panda or penguin update, then you probably found your problem.

If no luck there, I'd do the reconsideration request but don't mention anything about bad links.  You'll get a reply of either "no manual spam actions" or "please remove more bad links and try again"