Partner Site Hit with Penguin - Links hurt me
-
I work for a network of international websites, the site I work on is for Canada.
Our partners in Australia were hit by penguin hard because they hired a black hat SEO guy and didn't know. He was creating profiles on highly authoritative sites and keyword stuffing them. Now, they've completely dropped off the SERP.
This is where the issue occurs, because we are all international partners we are all linked together on the header of every page so visitors can choose their country. Now, because they were hit hard and we have reciprocal links (not for rankings but for usability) will we be affected? It seems like we have, but I just want some opinions out there.
Also, should we go ahead and stop linking our sites between countries to avoid this mess?
-
If it's algorithmic then they just need to fix it fast, if it's manual... they still need to fix it fast and then do a reconsideration request.
I would guess that as long as you don't have other bad signals it won't really affect your site, but maybe remove the links temporarily just to be on the safe side.
SEL just did this, which may be of interest: http://searchengineland.com/google-talks-penguin-update-recover-negative-seo-120463
Note that part where it states "In particular, pointing bad links at a good site with many other good signals seems to be like trying to infect it with a disease that it has antibodies to. The good stuff outweighs the bad."
-
Another good example of something Google didn't quite take into consideration with this update.
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
-
How do I get more video reviews on a new site?
Hi, I'm working on a site that has video reviews of various places. It's general information/experience that most people possess and production-wise they are selfies. These videos are then transcribed and, voila... searchable content. My problem is this... how do I get large numbers of people to go to the trouble to make a 2 minute selfie? I thought about HARO, since one could work in a plug for something, but they have a site traffic threshold that this new site isn't at. Any and all ideas on how to efficiently generate this content for a new site with very little traffic would be appreciated. Thanks!
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | 945010 -
Canonicalize vs Link Juice
I recently wrote (but have not published) a very comprehensive original article for my new website (which has pretty much no domain authority). I've been talking to the publisher of a very high Domain Authority site and they are interested in publishing it. The article will include 2-3 follow backlinks to my website. My question is should I: Repost the article in my own site and then request a "rel=canonical" from the high authority site Not re-post the article on my own site and just collect the link juice from the high authority site Which would be better for my overall SEO? Assume in case 1) that the high authority site would add a rel=canonical if I asked for it.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | wlingke20 -
Exchange link from sites in same google account
Hi everyone, Anybody have experience when you have some websites which stored in Google Webmaster Tool and they exchange links between sites. So is it good for sites? We are hosted on different server. Thank you so much
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Jeepster0 -
Can I use content from an existing site that is not up anymore?
I want to take down a current website and create a new site or two (with new url, ip, server). Can I use the content from the deleted site on the new sites since I own it? How will Google see that?
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | RoxBrock0 -
How Can I Check Competitors Linking Profile?
If I'm looking for weak points in my competitors linking structure, how can I use Open Site Explorer to do that? In other words, I'm not sure how to use Open Site Explorer? Zane
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | Springboks0 -
Link Wheel & Unnatural Links - Undoing Damage
Client spent almost a year with link wheels and mass link blasts - end result was getting caught by google. I have taken over, we;ve revamped the site and I'm finishing up with onsite optimization. Would anyone have any suggestions how to undo the damage of the unnatural links and get back into googles favour a little quicker? Or the best next steps to undo the damage.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | ravynn0 -
How Would You Go About Building a Private Link Network?
Assuming you need to build a private link network from scratch, how would you go about doing it? I am not looking for some shady tactic, but rather something that would be white hat, yet will help in our SEO efforts. Thanks in advance.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | ConversionChamp0 -
Opinions Wanted: Links Can Get Your Site Penalized?
I'm sure by now a lot of you have had a chance to read the Let's Kill the "Bad Inbound Links Can Get Your Site Penalized" Myth over at SearchEngineJournal. When I initially read this article, I was happy. It was confirming something that I believed, and supporting a stance that SEOmoz has taken time and time again. The idea that bad links can only hurt via loss of link juice when they get devalued, but not from any sort of penalization, is indeed located in many articles across SEOmoz. Then I perused the comments section, and I was shocked and unsettled to see some industry names that I recognized were taking the opposite side of the issue. There seems to be a few different opinions: The SEOmoz opinion that bad links can't hurt except for when they get devalued. The idea that you wouldn't be penalized algorithmically, but a manual penalty is within the realm of possibility. The idea that both manual and algorithmic penalties were a factor. Now, I know that SEOmoz preaches a link building strategy that targets high quality back links, and so if you completely prescribe to the Moz method, you've got nothing to worry about. I don't want to hear those answers here - they're right, but they're missing the point. It would still be prudent to have a correct stance on this issue, and I'm wondering if we have that. What do you guys think? Does anybody have an opinion one way or the other? Does anyone have evidence of it being one way or another? Can we setup some kind of test, rank a keyword for an arbitrary term, and go to town blasting low quality links at it as a proof of concept? I'm curious to hear your responses.
White Hat / Black Hat SEO | | AnthonyMangia0