Bad links or poor content?
-
Hi all
I have a meeting with our seo company tomorrow.... Our sites have dropped considerably for our main keywords. My opinion is that the links that have been built for us have focused on too few anchor text and many "money making" keywords. Also to deep pages rather than the home page. They are saying it's poor content (I guess they would). We copyscape check all content before putting live.
Has anyone any evidence I could present to them to back up my argument?
-
Hi
We had top listings for the main anchor text used, these are the terms which we have dropped out all together for....
The drop happened on the 28th Sept...
-
Another thing you can do is take a look at your analytics sorted by organic search traffic. Then, take the dates of the known Panda updates and Penguin updates and see if any of them correlate to the time of your traffic drop. If it correlates to Panda then it's a content issue, and if it correlates to Penguin it's a links issue.
It could be both though...if you've got 70% of your links having keyword anchor text this is a risk for Penguin.
Another thing you can do is sort your analytics according to anchor text. Let's say your top search term was "blue widgets". If your organic traffic for "blue widgets" dropped drastically after April 24 then it's likely Penguin.
But it's tough to know though as there were Panda updates on either side of Penguin.
-
Yep - thank you.
-
That is far too high Jason - with 300 links, I would want to see no more than 15-30 using that anchor text alone. There should be variations such as:
- New mobility scooters
- Used mobility scooters
- Mobility scooter review
- Best mobility scooters
- Mobility scooter parts
- Electric mobility scooters
Then take some of these longer such as:
- Where you can buy mobility scooters
- If you need a mobility scooter
You get the idea
Andy
-
An example being "mobility scooters" anchor text forms 209 links out of a total of 318.....
-
Then I would be looking for that to diversify in some order. If you had 100 links, to have 5-10 with the same anchor text is acceptable, as long as they form part of a sentence. You don't really want links that just sit there on their own amongst other links and that serve no real purpose. There are exceptions to this rule, however.
Would have to see some to give you more of an idea.
Andy
-
I've used the Open Site Explorer and it's showing that in some cases 70% of the links are based on one anchor text...
-
Try Open Site Explorer here Jason.
Also, building links to a wide selection of pages, and not all to the home page, is a positive, not a negative. However, diverse anchor texts and related referring sites play a big part in this and as long as a link has a good reason to exist on a page, I am sure Google will see this as a plus.
Andy
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Self linking
There are 10 links on page that point to this page where they exist (link to the page itself). Does it influence on ranking?
Link Building | | templatemonster0 -
Nasty links
Hi My first q on here (hoorah!), and it's about links (boo!). I've got what appears to be a handful (but worryingly, increasing in number) of links pointing to my site like this: http://condos.mrgulffront.com/florida-condos-for-sale/320-scenic-gulf-drive-miramar-beach-fl-32550-mls-567591/ I've made contact with the sites concerned, and had only one positive response who flatly denied all knowledge of it. The issue (as far as I can see) is that as in the above example the links (on the bottom right in the grey box) are forever changing so not always visible. Can anyone offer any guidance as to these kinds of nasty links.... I'm right at the v beginning on this "path of seo understanding" so please don't assume prior knowledge! Thanks in advance.... tom
Link Building | | T-J-I0 -
Do footer links pass less link juice?
One of my best inbound links for PA and DA happens to be a footer link, curious if it's less valuable or has any value at all.
Link Building | | Theskimonster0 -
If bad links are now ignored why bother to resubmit a reconsideration letter?
So what I don't get is that Google says it will not trust and ignore these Spam type links so you lose only the value from those specific links.So if someone was hit with a penalty why should you bother to write a reconsideration letter if Google is supposedly just ignoring the value of the poor links anyway? On the other hand in their message they do state if you are able to remove any of the links you can resubmit --- this is sending conflicting messages. Back in the day you get your entire site hurt, now it seems like it can potentially just be a few keywords or pages.Does it make sense with the new roll out in March 2013 to still do a reconsideration request?
Link Building | | SEOEnthusiast0 -
Great Content
Hello fellow Mozzers! I'm still new to the SEO game and have been doing lots of reading and research about SEO. From what I've learned nowadays it all comes down to great content and links that come from it. I have to admit I'm a visual learner, I need to see it to understand and learn better. I was hoping that someone can provide some examples of GREAT Content (whether its a blog post, page, article, etc...) I know EGOL is one of the most valuabe SEOMoz users and by reading his forum responses he always advises to write great content to build links... Hoping EGOL and other SEOMoz users would be so kind to share an example or two of what they think is great content. One more question (related). Since all the Google updates this year in regards to links and content, I've read numerous times on this Q&A forum that great content gets links, and that submitting articles to directories or buying links doesn't work anymore or at least not something that a whitehat SEO should implement for a long term strategy, does that mean that if you publish great content on your site that is informative, unique and valuable it will get you links without submitting to directories or buying links? Is it really that simple? Thank you in advance! Igor
Link Building | | igor.pinchevskiy0 -
Back Links
Hi there, I have been guest posting on blogs trying to build some back-links into my website, which so far is going not too bad, however I was wondering when writing these guest posts should I limit my post to let's say 2 back-links per guest post? If 2 back-links are going to different pages on my website, does the first back-links in the guest post have more value than the 2nd back-link? Kind Regards,
Link Building | | Paul780 -
Link building
Hello all ! I would love some opinions about one Link Building technical aspect from SEOs, link builders ... How important is the number of outgoing links on the page you have the opportunity to place a link ? (from a scale of 1-10 / what about where dose this factor fits overall with your check list , as important to consider as far as link building) Would you place a link on a page with 200+ outgoing external links if the page is ok (not involved in selling links, all links are related with the subject, target page, anchor text etc) or you would go with a link on a 10-15 links per page but not that 'powerful' and not that related (not spammy but more general on the subject that can contain links to some other non related resources). Eg: Option 1: www.whatever-name.com/links.html the entire domain is about x. It has 250 links in that page (in the links.html) all links on the links.html pages are somehow related / resources with x. Your link can be placed with an anchor text related with x that will target a page on your site related with x. Domain page rank : 6 (as a general indicator), Page PR, the links.html one, PR: 2 Option 2: www.some-other-name.com/x-is-so-great the entire domain is NOT about x, just the page. It has 5..10 links in that page (external links more or less related with x - but not spammy) Your link can be placed with an anchor text related with x that will target a page on your site related with x. Domain page rank : 3 (as a general indicator), Page PR, the links.html one, PR: 1 What's your best option ? Thanks !
Link Building | | eyepaq1 -
Reciprocal links
Hi SEOmoz Pros, We have vendors from whom I was hoping to get links. To make it more enticing to them I was planning to select a small number of vendors (with good site metrics-PA, DA, PR) and create a "Featured Vendor" module on some pages that would link back to the vendor's site as well--thereby created reciprocal links. I was planning to only have one vendor to a page and only for the pages that we are targeting locally. My hope is to help boost the ranking of those pages. Is it okay to offer our vendors to link back to their site or should I ask for a one-way link back to our page and pitch it as exposure for their brand?? Lastly, does Google penalize for these types of links? Thanks!
Link Building | | AC_Pro1