Yet another Negative SEO attack question.
-
I need help reconciling two points of view on spammy links.
On one hand, Google seems to say, "Don't build spammy links to your website - it will hurt your ranking." Of course, we've seen the consequences of this from the Penguin update, of those who built bad links got whacked.
From the Penguin update, there was then lots of speculation of Negative SEO attacks. From this, Google is saying, "We're smart enough to detect a negative SEO attack.", i.e: http://youtu.be/HWJUU-g5U_I
So, its seems like Google is saying, "Build spammy links to your website in an attempt to game rank, and you'll be penalized; build spammy links to a competitors website, and we'll detect it and not let it hurt them."
Well, to me, it doesn't seem like Google can have it both ways, can they? Really, I don't understand why Competitor A doesn't just go to Fiverr and buy a boatload of crappy exact match anchor links to Competitor B in an attempt to hurt Competitor B. Sure, Competitor B can disavow those links, but that still takes time and effort. Furthermore, the analysis needed for an unsophisticated webmaster could be daunting.
Your thoughts here? Can Google have their cake and eat it too?
-
If it can be proven that the intention was to cause harm to another companies profits I would think you could be held liable. There is enough documentation on the web to show that Google penalizes for bad links and that negative SEO exists, if there is proof that you were doing what Google tells you not to do against your competition and it results in a penalty that Google says will happen, it seems like bad intentions can be proven and in that case you could be found guilty in a court of law. I am not aware of any precedents though.
-
Thanks, your reply helps keep this in perspective.
if it is proven that you created these links my guess would be
you could be held liable in court.This would be another interesting tangent discussion. Of course, the defense would be the first amendment right of freedom of publishing. In my feeble knowledge, I'm not aware of a court case that has encountered this issue, but it's an interesting legal question: Could you be held civilly liable for merely publishing links?
-
I completely agree with your comments Steve. Especially when it comes to a niche where there are only a couple of big companies and it's seasonal. If you can knock out the competitor during their busiest month of the year you've done major damage to them and have benefited yourself greatly. It's a horrible, shady practice and even though Google initiated the penalty, if it is proven that you created these links my guess would be you could be held liable in court.
-
Why is competitor A spending their time and money trying to harm Competitor
B whenthey can simply protect themself with the Disavow Tool Why not
spend those time and money on building quality links.Buying links on Fiverr = $5 and five minutes.
Disavowing links = a couple of hours of analysis or paying someone a bit of cash for the analysis.
So, it's easier to create the havoc, than to clean it up. I'm sure we're all on the same page that such a technique isn't ethical, doesn't help you build up your business, is bad business karma, and so on. But, is it feasible? Apparently so. Especially when the stakes are high, for Commerce sites, it seems like this would become a tempting strategy for the less ethically inclined.
-
There is no way that Google can know (unless you are intentionally transparent about it) if someone you paid or someone a competitor paid built those links for you. Negative SEO is very real but it takes time and money to get a site penalized, and now it's easier than it ever was to disavow links and get a site back which helps take some of the punch out of the negative SEO business.
-
Hi Steve,
I think I see your point. However, if Competitor A buys low quality links to Competitor B, yes, they can use the disavow tool to remove the links and it will still take time for them to do so and effort but what is the point in this. Why is competitor A spending their time and money trying to harm Competitor B when they can simply protect themself with the Disavow Tool Why not spend those time and money on building quality links.
Competitor A is simply wasting time and money to buy links where Competitor B is spending time and effot to remove them. I don't see why anyone would do that.
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 noindex shop page and blog page for SEO?
I have about 15 products in my store. Should I noindex shop and blog page for SEO? The reason I ask this question is because I see someone suggesting noindex archives pages. And the shop page is product archive and blog page is archive too, so should I choose index or noindex? Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Helloiamgood0 -
Clean-up Question after a wordpress site Hack added pages with external links from a massive link wheel?
Hey All, Thought I would throw this out to ensure I am dotting my "i's" and crossing my "t's"..... Client WordPress site was hacked injected 3-4 pages that cross linked to hundreds (affiliate junk spam link wheel). Pages were removed, 3rd party cleared all malware/viruses. Heavy duty firewall and security monitoring are in place. Hacked pages are now showing as 404. No penalties, ranking issues....If anything there was a temporary BOOST in rankings due to the large link-wheel type net that the pages were receiving....That has since leveled out rankings. I guess my question is, in your opinion is it best to let those pages 404, I am noticing a large amount of links going to them from all over the world from this large link net that was built. I find the temptation to 301 re-direct deleted pages to the homepage difficult...lol..{the temptation is REAL}. Is there anything I am missing? Any other steps that YOU would take? I am assuming letting those pages 404 would be the best bet, as in time they will roll off index.... Thank you in advance, I appreciate any feedback or opinions....
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Anthony_Howard0 -
What is your SEO agency doing in terms of link building for clients?
What are you or your SEO agency doing for your client's link building efforts? What are you (or the agency) doing yourself, or out-sourcing, or having the client do for link building? If a new client needs some serious link building done, what do you prescribe and implement straight off the bat? What are your go-to link building tactics for clients? What are the link building challenges faced by your agency in 2013/2014? What's working for your agency and what's not? Does your agency work closely with the client's marketing department to gain link traction? If so, what are collaborating on? What else might you be willing to share about your agencies link building practices? Thanks
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Martin_S0 -
2 Questions about 301 Redirects
So I have a couple of questions about 301 redirects: Do Google penalties EVER pass through a 301? I've done 20+ domain 301s in the last year and have yet to see it happen, but the other day I read a an article (or maybe it was a QA post?) that suggested doing 302s to avoid transferring penalties. Has anyone seen any authoritative information regarding this? I 301'd a domain in February that another SEO firm had built a lot of spammy links and I began building contextual links for it at a very slow rate (like 10 or so a month). Within a month, my domain authority was a 26 on the new domain and my inbound links were non existent. By month 2, my links were 70k and domain authority was 34. By month 3, down to 25k inbound links and domain authority of 29, where it has settled for the last 3 months despite some really high quality links. My question (don't worry it's coming), is does anyone have any clue why my links shot up so quickly and then dropped? I'm assuming the 301 links kicked in and then only about 45% ended up 'sticking'?? Thanks in advance
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | BrianJGomez0 -
Knowledge Graph SEO Factors
I notice when I search for my clients brand name it pulls up the Google local info and Google+ stuff, knowledge graph etc, as well as a section at the bottom, 'People Also Search For' and lists a number of the clients competitors. However when I search one of the competitors no Google local or knowledge graph stuff comes up. Client obviously wants to limit promotion of the competitors. Does anyone have any experience with this? I know Google Author rank seems to play a factor in knowledge graph results? Are the competitors doing anything on their end SEO wise? What can be done to limit this? Thanks for any help! jkn0BMT.png
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | EmarketedTeam0 -
What if White Hat SEO does not get results?
If company A is paying 5k a month and some of that budget is buying links or content that might be in the gray area but is ranking higher than company B that's following the "rules" and paying the same but not showing up at all, what's company B suppose to do?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | EmarketedTeam2 -
How Is Your Approach Towards Adult SEO?
I would like to know how SEOMoz community members approach adult SEO. How do you approach a project when you get one (if you do it that is). If you dont do adult SEO, why do you not do it? Is it because it's much more difficult than normal SEO or do you not want to associate yourself with that industry?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | ConversionChamp0 -
HELP! My client got a DDOS Attack! Need advice
Here the setup: Server is hosted inhouse. It got attacked using a DDOS from 20+ IP addresses spoofing in different counries. Our server overloaded and didn't work anymore. URL is registered at GoDaddy. Signed up at Dreamhost. We pointed DNS to Dreamhost successfully. Attacks kept coming and messed up other sites on the Dreamhost shared server. We didn't know we were being followed at first. We originally thought they were attacking the IP address on our inhouse server. Dreamhost noticed the attack and put us on a seperate IP and disabled our URL until the attacks 'stopped'. MY QUESTION IS: What do I do if they don't stop? Close shop? 99% of the business is internet driven. This has to be the blackest Blackhat SEO ever.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Francisco_Meza0