Should you do a disavow even if you don't have a manual penalty?
-
If you are working on a website which has a history spammy links, but no manual penalty by Google... is it still worthwhile to still go through the link removal and disavow process?
Thoughts appreciated.
-
Thanks Sam and Matt,
Great responses and I'll now get going on disavowing the project I'm working on.
Much appreciated.
-
I agree with Samuel's response. Yes, you should disavow the bad links. Why wait to drop in rankings and see how long it takes to regain them? Given the time available you should always be creating the best profile you can and now that Google has given us this tool, use it.
(Just a note - we've proactively disavowed over 1200 clients link profiles and have NOT seen a negative effect on them. We have seen some good results even for those who didn't "have a penalty.")
-
The short answer? Matt Cutts, the head of Google's web-spam team, says, "Yes!" Look at this article. Here's the main quote:
"If you are at all worried about someone trying to do negative SEO or it looks like there's some weird bot that's building up a bunch of links to your site and you have no idea where it came from, that's the perfect time to use disavow as well," Cutts said. "I wouldn't worry about going ahead and disavowing links even if you don't have a message in your webmaster console."
The long answer? In my opinion, I would agree. If you think that there's even a chance that you could be hit by a penalty now or in the future, then I would disavow. Obviously, you want to prevent this from occurring long before it would ever happen. And if you are questioning whether your links may cause your site to get hit, then you likely have a problem simply because you're asking yourself the question.
However, it always depends on the site itself. If you or a bad SEO have done things like bulk directory submissions with exact-match anchor text, then you surely want to disavow them as soon as possible. But if you only have a few questionable links, then it's less urgent. But I would disavow any and all of them and start focusing on earning links (rather than building them) through content and PR (as I wrote in this Moz post).
Good luck!
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
-
Should I disavow these links?
Hi all, I have a ski website that I am currently performing a toxic backlink audit on. I have noted that a lot of the links being flagged as toxic/spammy by the tool I am using seem to be the same/similar sites with different URLs. The sites are vaguely related to skiing (relating to helicopter travel options for travelling to ski resorts) but it is concerning me that there are so many of them and they are being flagged as so toxic.
Link Building | | SolveWebMedia
Do you think it is worth disavowing these? Or contacting the owner to ask them to remove the link? I have included an example of some of the links below. https://www.cannes-helicopters.co.uk/index.php?menuopen=21&showcontent=5
https://nice-helicopter.co.uk/index.php?menuopen=21&showcontent=5
https://monaco-helicopter.co.uk/index.php?menuopen=21&showcontent=5 Slightly different site but same favicon icon:
https://monaco-helicopter.co.uk/index.php?menuopen=21&showcontent=5
https://www.whitetracks-holidays.com/Helicopter_Transfers_Villars_Switzerland.htm Thanks in advance for any advice / help!0 -
Disavow question
Hi there, I have 2 website's, and one of them will be redirected to the other. For both I need to do a disavow list, but I don't know how is better. I should make only one disavow list for the main site, and include the link from the site that I will redirect, or make a list for each website?
Link Building | | Silviu0 -
Why Moz OSE, Ahrefs, Majestic and so on, don't change their user agent while crawling?
Some blackhat websites, PBNs and other "cheaters" are using various methods to effectively block third party backlink checker bots (OSE, Ahrefs, Majestic...) : robot.txt, IP and such. A simple solution for those bots would be to mimic Google by using its user agent string for example.
Link Building | | astronaute
Or if not legally permitted (which I doubt) use some kind of randomness in user agent strings, urls, and IPs in order to prevent blocking. This should not be a big deal IMHO, am I missing something obvious ?0 -
Can 302's Negate Spam Link Profile?
To make a long story short, the previous SEO company we hired spammed us on LOTS of crappy links, many of which are still indexed. We're currently in the act of removing these links before we receive a manual spam penalty/notification + building new, stronger links to balance out our profile. While most of these garbage links were sent to our homepage, many are linking our Services page (and a bunch to our .com/sitemap.html for some reason, lol). Now we're in the midst of updating our entire website and the permalinks are going to change. While I'd normally 301 our old links to the new ones, Id rather not bring the horrible link profile with it if at all possible. Would a simple 302 redirect effectively dodge the bad juju from these spam links to our Services page since they pass 0 juice? Any thoughts on this would be appreciated. Thanks!
Link Building | | kirmeliux0 -
Does Adding Affiliate ID's to Link Affects it's Value
Hello, I have a question about adding Affiliate ID's to links. I receive a DoFollow link to my website with an affiliate ID in order to track the leads and the traffic that comes from each affiliate link/website. does this link (with the affiliate ID) pass Juice from the affiliate website? (I use canonical link element on my website pages)? how does Google deals with links with affiliate IDs ? is adding Affiliate ID to links reduces it's value?
Link Building | | JonsonSwartz0 -
Perhaps the SEOMoz beginner's guide should be updated?
I was on the phone tonight with a site owner who may have been affected by Penguin. I was explaining how overuse of keywords with anchor text can adversely affect a site and he asked me an interesting question: "If that is the case, then why does the SEOMoz guide say differently?" Here are some quotes from the SEOMoz beginner's guide: "Anchor Text - One of the strongest signals the engines use in rankings is anchor text. If dozens of links point to a page with the right keywords, that page has a very good probability of ranking well for the targeted phrase in that anchor text." That pretty much implies that you should try to get as many keyword anchor texted links to your site as possible. There should probably be some type of Penguin warning in here. "Self-Created, Non-Editorial - Hundreds of thousands of websites offer any visitor the opportunity to create links through guest book signings, forum signatures, blog comments, or user profiles. These links offer the lowest value, but can, in aggregate, still have an impact for some sites. " Granted, the text goes on to say this: "In general, search engines continue to devalue most of these types of links, and have been known to penalize sites that pursue these links aggressively. Today, these types of links are often considered spammy and should be pursued with caution." That's a good warning, but I think it could be perhaps made a little more clear that self made links like this are not wise to use as an SEO tool. I think that to a beginner, it kind of sounds like the guide is saying, "There are lots of opportunities out there where you can get a link by making one yourself. Go ahead and use them but don't overdo it."
Link Building | | MarieHaynes6 -
JavaScript is crawled by search engines, isn’t it? Does it mean that links embedded in JavaScript pass link juice?
I wonder If links embedded in JavaScript from an external Website pass link juice to the linked page and thus have a positive effect on google rankings. I read that JavaScipt is craweld. Does it mean that also the link juice is passed? I'm looking forward to your answers.
Link Building | | Tabea0 -
What's the best way to find some guest blogging opportunities?
In the forum's experience, what have you found the best way to find guest blogging opportunities? e.g. google search syntax that has worked well and other more diverse methods would be appreciated! Thanks
Link Building | | PeterAlexLeigh0