Which Links to Disavow!
-
We just took over SEO for a new client who is being penalized for a bad link profile. They've asked Google to reconsider multiple times, and Google still claims that the links are bad.
Because of this, and because I don't have direct access (logins, etc.) to what the former SEO did, I am considering using the disavow links tool. The most obvious links to disavow are a group of almost 1000 links that come from the same forum.
However, when viewing the links on this forum they actually seem natural. People are reviewing the product (ipod cases), both negatively and positively. While this could have been an SEO tactic for link building, I don't want to disavow these links if they're not the problem, even though this domain is the source of almost all the low-quality links.
Another site that has more than 200 links is Askives. Do any of you have experience with links from Askives, or removing these links?
Thanks again!
-
I'm also wondering if anybody has had any experience with askives.com. There are a few sites like that and they must be pretty common among people forced to use the disavow tool... Is there a list anywhere of known sites whos links are viewed as spammy by Google?
Thanks!
-
Thanks for the answer! This is great info.
I've now briefly combed through all 800 linking root domains listed in Webmaster Tools, and it appears that there are thousands of links coming from fake blogs as well, so it looks like my task will be to go through these, one by one, to make sure they really are the links Google is penalizing.
Unfortunately the client doesn't have very many natural links, and I am a bit afraid that his rankings will briefly dip if I disavow most of these. It's possible that some of them are not being penalized.
Anyway, in our efforts to make the Web a better place, it's worth it to our client to go ahead and disavow.
Thanks again for your feedback!
-
Hi Tynan,
This is a sticky issue a lot of webmasters face these days. Although I can't tell you exactly what links to disavow, I can point you in the right direction.
1. What links to look at? First of all, John Mueller of Google recommends starting with the links listed in Google Webmaster Tools, as these are the links most likely to effect your rankings: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UX5i4iuru7k&feature=youtu.be&t=54m28s
2. Third Party Tools: A couple of companies have developed tools to help identify bad links.
- SEOGadget Link Analyser - http://tools.seogadget.co.uk/ (has a great API - highly recommend this site)
- Link Detox - http://www.linkdetox.com/ (haven't used it, but I've heard decent things)
3. Manual Review - In the end, you're own eye is the best tool you have. You want to look for:
- links with keyword-rich, optimized anchor text
- Comment Signature and Forum Signature links (these are different from the more legitimate forum links)
- Sitewide links, such as in the sidebar or footer
- Obviously paid, or suspicious looking links on low-quality sites
Our friend Paddy Moogan wrote a great guide on how to do this step by step. You should check it out.
Unfortunately, I can't tell you for certain if you should disavow those forum links. That said, in my experience, it's better to disavow entire sites using the domain: function, then it is to try to disavow individual URLs. Google is much more forgiving if you over-disavow then the reverse, but in the end you must use your best human judgement.
Hope this helps! Best of luck with your SEO.
-
Are those domains in the Google index?
Have you tried "site:example.com" for the sites you're mentioning?
I haven't had to do this myself but I've heard that that's what you try.
If those sites aren't indexed then they probably are no good.
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 Know which links are bad?
Hi All I have currently got a Manual Action on my Webmaster Tools account due to some unnatural links and I am in the process of seeding out the poor links with a view to having them removed or disavowed. Other than looking at each link individually to see if it looks relevant or spammy. Any ideas on how I can gauge which links are bad and which aren't??
Link Building | | Pete40 -
Pinterest and Link Juice
I can't understand why our Pinterest boards don't show up as external links (nor do our YouTube videos). However, one of our competitor's Pinterest boards is in the top ten as far as their external links go. Clues?
Link Building | | Greatmats0 -
Does the twitter link shortening service reduce link value (strength).
We have many SEO team members that use Twitters link shortening service, will this reduce the strength or value of the page to be indexed? I ask this cause the displayed URL isn't the actual page it is going to and would like to make appropriate changes to improve our company's SEO For example: http://t.co/zHu8vIcjPx is going to page http://4wheelonline.com/atv/QuadBoss.107503 Thank you for your assistance.
Link Building | | WebRiverGroup0 -
Promoting A Guide for links
Hi everyone, I'm formulating a content idea to provide the Internet's most comprehensive guide for our related field and wanted to know how people would promote a guide if they were producing one. Really the topic of choice doesn't need to be mentioned, so I'll leave that out so answers are open and can help a range of people attempting to do a similar thing. One of the goals is to of course produce more unique and useful content for our site (helping our ranking), which will help people out who have an interest or question related to our topic, but once the content is on the site, how would you go about getting links towards to guide? Would you contact websites that have written about similar content in the past and ask if they would add a link to the guide in their already existing content? Or would you ask them to bear it in mind for reference purposes in future content? Would you visit guest posting? Obviously one of the goals of the content is for links, and that will be the driver behind whether or not the content is produced. I firstly need to show that there are potential links we can gain almost immediately after the content is ready. From there, I'm hoping the content will promote itself, with people referencing the content on forums and articles when questions are raised. However, for the content to get in front of the influencers (those who would answers the questions on forums or write articles about the subject) the content needs to be visible - i.e rank or be mentioned from a highly visible source. Any ideas or comments from people who have promoted guides successfully before will be extremely welcome. Note: This is more the promoting of content and not really related to the research to find out which content to produce. Thanks.
Link Building | | purpleindigo0 -
No inbound links ?
Hello I just got SeoMoz, started the whole thing and compared myself to my competitor. I'm writing for mayor national newspapers in latin america, been featured a few major sites, and got a whole lot of links directing to muy site. I recently moved domains about a month ago from rxmagaizne.mx to rxmagazine.co. Is this the reason i'm not seeing any links ? ibIPY.png
Link Building | | timi-do0 -
Disavow Links tool just launched by Google
http://searchengineland.com/google-launches-disavow-links-tool-136826 Just thought I would share this.
Link Building | | activitysuper0 -
How many links is too many?
I know this is a bit of a difficult one to answer but would appreciate some opinions.
Link Building | | Entrusteddev0 -
How might Google differentiate between an artificial link exchange and partners linking to each other?
Hi, All! Artificial link exchanges (contacting a vaguely connected site and requesting to exchange links to increase your PR) is, as far as I know, considered an outdated, not-so-smart technique, as Google might devalue them. Yet, for real business partners to exchange links seems to be an entirely accepted and encouraged technique. While that would be intuitive to a human who's viewing the pages. how might Google detect when two sites that link to each other are linking because they are trusted business associates (valuable) as opposed to when they are doing a link exchange (devalued)? Thanks! Aviva
Link Building | | debi_zyx0