Can the disavow tool INCREASE rankings?
-
Hi Mozzers,
I have a new client who has some bad links in their profile that are spammy and should be disavowed.
They rank on the first page for some longer tail keywords. However, we're aiming at shorter, well-known keywords where they aren't ranking.
Will the disavow tool, alone, have the ability to increase rankings (assuming on-site / off-site signals are better than competition)?
Thanks,
Cole
-
I'm working on a site that had a very poor disavow file in place from a previous agency. I went through the link profile with a fine tooth comb and added a bunch more domains to the file. Organic traffic has gone up over 80%.
That is not our only problem and there are other factors to work on but the cleansing is reassuring even though we know the profile is pretty thin. But again that just goes to show quality always wins over quantity.
I would say there may be a whole host of issues hampering ranking but a dirty profile is a must fix, no matter the immediate outcome. I explain to clients that I anticipate a short term fall and why to set their expectations, then anything positive is a great bonus.
-
We were under penalty for certain keywords as a result of a poor link building strategy in the past. This led us to have to use the disavow tool in a fairly broad manner. The results were pretty inconclusive though, while we certainly saw some of the keywords recover as a result, this was not in the manner that they were at before penalty and we saw the most dramatic effect on the long tail keywords.
There were instances of shorter keywords improving, though this was fairly minimal. What I would say though is that it is still better to disavow those spammy backlinks now than suffer in the long term as a result and even if there is no improvement I would not necessarily expect to see a drop as a result.
Tim
-
Very good question and this has been covered in this great moz article: http://moz.com/blog/after-penalty-removed-will-traffic-increase
Will it help, maybe not in the short term - but if you do nothing you are running the risks of being penalised further down the line and losing all your rankings. Thats the worse case, the best case is by removing the old links your rankings increase. I would never really leave bad links, as you will always be looking over your shoulder waiting for Google to strike.
Remove them and then concentrate on getting some quality links to your site to help boost rankings.
With Google you can never really predict anything any more and you won't really know the outcome till you have removed the bad links.
Worse case: you remove the bad links and your rankings don't improve - but your no longer looking over your shoulder waiting to see if you have been hit by the next update.
Best case: You suddenly jump up in the rankings and you no longer care about the next update, you actually look forward to them, to see which off your competition has been hit.
You will probably get neither of these by removing them, you will probably see a little improvement but nothing massive and you won't have to look over your shoulder.
I know I haven't really answered your question - but even if Google was to answer this question, they would only be guessing as they can't 100% accurately say what will happen as its all machine learnt.
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
-
Free tool, and it ranks well for adult sites and checking if they are down, will that hurt us with ranking for normal sites with google?
Hi all, We rank for searches around "is youporn down" and similar because we provide a free tool to check if a website is up or down: https://downforeveryoneorjustme.com/youporn I am worried that ranking for these adult searches is hurting us with ranking for things like "is reddit down", thoughts? I'd appreciate some input!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | bwb0 -
Massive rank drop on one particular keyword
As all other marketeers do I follow closely my keywords, one particular keyword has ranked continually at #2 and has suddenly dropped to +#60, but all others remain the same. We are a fairly large site in terms of numbers 9m views annually, could it be possible that someone has black hatted that particular keyword, and if so how do I find out how and more importantly who?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | sususu0 -
Can I post an article on my blog if it has already been published and taken down?
Hi Guys, A writer for my site has offered to let me post her article on my blog, however the article has already been published on another blog, but the blog has now been taken down. If I publish this on my blog will there be any harm to my blog? I want to stay clean and not be in trouble with penguin in any way shape or form! Cheers everyone appreciate some advice here!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | edward-may0 -
Rank Drop Possibly due to links but no warning in GWT
Hello, We've been experiencing rank drop in all major keywords for the past 9 months. I've had different people say different things here at Moz about how backlinks effect rank drop. Brilliant answers, but different opinions. Nothing is showing up in GWT for this site. Here's the backlink breakdown: 72 linking root domains. 20 of those are blogs. These blogs have no backlinks in and of themselves, and were created originally as easy links. Not white hat stuff. Three additional root domains are still paid links in this profile, though all but one was made to look editorial. The one that doesn't look editorial has links sprinkled throughout their website, among other paid links. The rest of the linking root domains (49) are legitimate. Again, nothing shows up in GWT. We had 96 root domains last March but in March of 2013 we cut most of the paid links and half (20) of the blogs. This brought our ranking down immediately by 2 or 3 slots. We've been slipping every since. I would like people to speak from experience and let me know if you think the backlinks could be causing the ranking drop and what to do about it. Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | BobGW0 -
When to NOT USE the disavow link tool
Im not here to say this is concrete and should never do this, and please if you disagree with me then lets discuss. One of the biggest things out there today especially after the second wave of Penguin (2.0) is the fear striken web masters who run straight to the disavow tool after they have been hit with Penguin or noticed a drop shortly after. I had a friend who's site who never felt the effects of Penguin 1.0 and thought everything was peachy. Then P2.0 hit and his rankings dropped of the map. I got a call from him that night and he was desperately asking me for help to review his site and guess what might have happened. He then tells me the first thing he did was compile a list of websites back linking to him that might be the issue and create his disavow list and submitted it. I asked him "How long did you research these sites before you came the conclusion they were the problem?" He Said "About an hour" Then I asked him "Did you receive a message in your Google Webmaster Tools about unnatural linking?" He Said "No" I said "Then why are you disavowing anything?" He Said "Um.......I don't understand what you are saying?" In reading articles, forums and even here in the Moz Q/A I tend to think there is some misconceptions about the disavow tool from Google that do not seem to be clearly explained. Some of my findings with the tool and when to use it is purely based on logic IMO. Let me explain When to NOT use the tool If you spent an hour reviewing your back link profile and you are to eager to wait any longer to upload your list. Unless you have less than 20 root domains linking to you, you should spend a lot more than an hour reviewing your back link profile You DID NOT receive a message from GWT informing you that you had some "unnatural" links Ill explain later If you spend a very short amount of time reviewing your back link profile. Did not look at each individual site linking to you and every link that exists, then you might be using it WAY TO SOON. The last thing you want to do is disavow a link that actually might be helping you. Take the time to really look at each link and ask your self this question (Straight from the Google Guidelines) "A good rule of thumb is whether you'd feel comfortable explaining what you've done to a website that competes with you, or to a Google employee" Studying your back link profile We all know when we have cheated. Im sure 99.9% of all of us can admit to it at one point. Most of the time I can find back links from sites and look right at the owner and ask him or her "You placed this back link didn't you?" I can see the guilt immediately in their eyes 🙂 Remember not ALL back links you generate are bad or wrong because you own the site. You need to ask yourself "Was this link necessary and does it apply to the topic at hand?", "Was it relevant?" and most important "Is this going to help other users?". These are some questions you can ask yourself before each link you place. You DID NOT receive a message about unnatural linking This is were I think the most confusing takes place (and please explain to me if I am wrong on this). If you did not receive a message in GWT about unnatural linking, then we can safely say that Google does not think you contain any "fishy" spammy links in which they have determined to be of a spammy nature. So if you did not receive any message yet your rankings dropped, then what could it be? Well it's still your back links that most likely did it, but its more likely the "value" of previous links that hold less or no value at all anymore. So obviously when this value drops, so does your rank. So what do I do? Build more quality links....and watch you rankings come back 🙂
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | cbielich1 -
Article pages not ranking as well as they should
Hello, Our articles here are not ranking as strongly as they should. Could you take a look and tell me why? When I search for the exact article title we do not come up. We used to. Note our sitewide footer links to some articles in case that's the problem, but even articles not in the footer links aren't performing.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | BobGW0 -
Can our white hat links get a bad rap when they're alongside junk links busted by Panda?
My firm has been creating content for a client for years - video, blog posts and other references. This client's web vendor has been using bad links and link farms to bolster rank for key phrases - successfully. Until last week when Google slapped them. They have been officially warned on WMT for possibly using artificial or unnatural links to build PageRank. They went from page one of the most popular term in Chicago for their industry where they had been for over a year - to page 8 - overnight. Other less generic terms that we were working on felt the sting as well. I was aware of and had warned the client of the possibility of repercussions from these black hat tactics (http://www.seomoz.org/blog/how-google-makes-liars-out-of-the-good-guys-in-seo#jtc170969), but didn't go as far as to recommend they abandon them. Now I'm wondering if one of our legitimate sites (YoChicago.com), which has more than its share of the links into the client site is being considered a bad link. All of our links are legitimate, i.e., anchor text equals description of destination, video links describe the entity that is linked to. Our we vulnerable? Any insight would be appreciated.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | mikescotty0