Real-Life Negative SEO Study
-
This isn't so much of a question as an offer
The Offer first, then the story. We are currently the target of a sustained negative SEO. This was only discovered in the last 3 or 4 days (Webmaster reports impressions down from 15,000 to 1,600!). I'm not asking for help, I believe we know what to do in order to combat it. My question is whether anyone at MOZ would like to use it as a real-life ongoing case study. We are not a new company and have never dabbled in black hat SEO. All current thinking suggests that this shouldn't have been possible given our age and reputation. A summary of our company/site below:
- 9 Year old domain
- $3m annual sales
- Previous Inc. 500 Fastest Growing Company
- 25,000 Facebook fans
- Hundreds of natural links including CNN.com, Washington Post, Inc.com
I'm not the best writer and I'm not that technical. I would gladly give the right person full access to anaylics, webmaster tools, sales reports, interviews. Given that this is still ongoing (and there's always a chance we might not recover!) I suspect this would make a great case study for the community given the right author.
-
Thanks Yiannis.
I was actually hoping for someone from Moz, or at least a blogger they might nominate. At least for now I'd rather not hand out our company info to anyone outside of MOZ, but I'll certainly keep it in mind.
-
Hello Robb,
I would love to jump at the chance and do an in-depth analysis on this. I work as an SEO analyst for 2 different Digital Agencies. How can we discuss further?
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
-
SEO Guidelines for Partner Links
We decided to follow an aggressive strategy with cross linking. We have cross linked all all the 6 different brands just above the header of a News Portal. You could see what i mean here www.in.gr
Industry News | | DOLdatacenter
Do you think that i should enable the nofollow so as not to get penalized by Google. We tend to use the same cross network linking scheme (in the header) for all branded sites. Google’s guidance on link schemes doesn’t specifically address these types of partner links, which don’t really fit the mold for “excessive link exchanging.” Thoughts appreciated.0 -
SEO For Local Searches
I run a driving school of over 100 instructors in the UK. We cover around 60 different areas. My homepage www.driveJohnsons.co.uk is optimised for 'driving lessons' and 'driving school' search terms mainly. My area pages are optimised for the same but with the area included ie: Driving Lessons Birmingham or Driving Lessons Leeds I've taken a drop in many areas... I've cleaned up my incoming links using the disavow too and upped more relevant links associated with the same industry as myself. The question i have is should i change my URL's for my area pages from www.driveJohnsons.co.uk/driving-lessons-leeds to: www.driveJohnsons.co.uk/leeds I've been told stuffing the URL with keywords for an area actually dilutes the strength of my homepage and all the other areas. At the moment i have 60 area pages with: www.drivejohnsons.co.uk/driving-lessons-area It use to work a treat, but i've started seeing some companies change their URLs to: /area and excluding the driving-lessons If i make this change then i'm either going to have to bit the bullet on build up links for those areas again or do a redirect for each area. I've added most areas to google places and i've added google map to many of area pages too. If anyone knows a bit more, please let me know...
Industry News | | Anthony19820 -
A suggestion to SEOs that cold call potential clients
Learn some basic salesmanship. Do you realize that business owners are getting 3-4 phone calls and emails a day from other SEOs claiming to be the best? Be polite, ask questions, and don't insult me or yourself through ignorance. Ask questions. You might just discover that we could work together. When you tell me that I'm not ranking for "competitive keywords" it tells me that you don't know what I'm trying to rank for. When you tell me you can get me to the top of Google in 3 months or less, you're still telling me that you don't know my business and what I want from my website. Who said I wanted national ranking anyway? Oh right, not me because you never asked. And if I answer the question "Do you want more business/leads?" with "No." Then politely end the conversation and move on. The rare time that I do get asked about my current efforts, don't insult me by calling me an amateur. I may be one, but talking down to me, or trying to make SEO sound like you're turning lead into gold will get a quick hang up from me. If you want a contract with me, learn to negotiate based on my needs, not your process that you feel married to. There are a lot of business owners out there that would be willing to work with you if you treated you leads with respect rather than iteration 23 of your cold call script. And in response to the person this morning that sent a "free report" of basic SEO fixes for my website, make sure you put that report together using **my website. ** I know you're working from a template, so it should be really easy to remove the info from the wedding company and the lawyer's webpages before you email it to me.
Industry News | | wreevesc0 -
Does Sticky Post in WordPress Have Impact on SEO?
Hi, I Have a Blog that I have attached a "sticky" post, obviously the content in the "sticky" post is the content that I want to ensure that everyone sees. I do update, by adding new posts daily or at least everyother day, my question is: Is the "sticky" post hurting, helping, or is it indifferent to SEO? I know the SE enjoy fresh content, and was wondering does that fresh content have to pop-up at the top of the page otr not. Any input would be great. Thanks. Jimmy
Industry News | | jimmy02250 -
Looking for Freelance SEO'ers
Hi, I wouldn't normally post a request for freelancers here, but I noticed someone else has done it and its not against the rules! so here goes... We are looking for Freelancers to help with our work load. In particular we are searching for Link Builders who can establish links on various websites through the use of article writing/blog content posting and other methods. Also, we require general SEOs who can perform the usual technical tasks such as creating 301's, canonicals and SEO audit reports on client websites. Ideally we only want UK based, white hatters with at least 2 years SEO experience. Please pm me if this interests you. Thanks Aran
Industry News | | Chiefblob0 -
Local SEO Agency Suggestions
I've looked under the "recommended companies" tab of seomoz, but all of the SEO Agencies listed seem to be geared towards big businesses. Most of their contact pages have starting budgets that are way out of my league. I do my own web-development and on-site SEO, but due to the demands of my job, I do not have the time needed to focus on link-building, and any other kind of content marketing (other than occasional guest blogging). Can anyone recommend an individual or agency that can start with a $500 - $600 monthly budget and move up from there? My search terms are local to my city, and not all that competitive, just looking for someone who can help. Thanks in advance for any recommendations.
Industry News | | ChaseH0 -
Problem with SOME Indian based SEO companies, HELP!
First of all I want to say that I hire 2 great Indian SEOs at my company and this question is in no way meant to offend, or single anyone out. However It's come to a point where the amount of emails we receive for "Ethical SEO, High PR Guaranteed Link building Services, SEO professionals etc" from Indian based companies is costing us a lot of time on a daily basis to filter out spam from real enquiries. Blocking their emails is not even working as they use gmail accounts and multiple domain emails so we can't keep up with them. I have even spoken to some of the owners of these 'companies' and they admit using different email accounts so as not to be blacklisted. They also seem to believe that the opt-out option (which is legally required when sending out promotional emails) is itself optional!!!!! Now when I asked how exactly they were getting my email they said that they get info from the, and I quote "first page of Google"!!!!! So my question is the following; is there anyway I can block my site from showing up in a particular country altogether? Again this is in no way attacking ALL Indian based SEO companies, my beef is with the 74 (we counted) different 'companies' that are flooding our email with offers P.S. Is anyone else having these issues?
Industry News | | MassivePrime0 -
Node.js for SEO
We've got a client building a site using node.js (http://nodejs.org/) I'm not at all familiar with this and of course need to know how nodejs impacts SEO? Are you familiar with it? Any sites you know of using it? But as I said, bottom line - how will it impact the SEO on the site?
Industry News | | VMLYRDiscoverability1