Whether or not to remove a link from a website with high spam score on Open Site Explorer
-
Hello Moz!
I just subscribed for your Moz Pro program. Amazing stuff!
On open site explorer, I found a number of links to my site from a page called with a very high page authority and high domain authority, but also a high spam score (8 or 9, one with a 10).
I say multiple spam scores, because it's strange, there are what appears variations of the same url, and each one is considered a link. For instance, there's an abc.linkstomysite.com and xyz.linktomysite.com, and 123.linktomysite.com... there are about 15 of these (all with the spam scores mentioned above)!
This must have been some old SEO work done I payed for back in the prehistoric SEO days. However, my fear is the following: Removing these links, and then losing some potentially strong link juice. I don't have many high DA or PA links to my site, and these are some major ones.
The domain in question "linktomysite.com", when entered into OSE, only has a spam score of 4, and it has a domain authority of 45 and page authority of 37. My site has a spam score of 2 and no messages from google regarding a penalty, but an overall reduction in google traffic over the years (just keeps slowly dropping... as if a weight is pulling me down?)
What do you think, should I leave, or remove? The linkstomysite page is just a LONG page full of links, with short descriptions, nothing of value, but with a an old domain age (relatively).
Most important for me is keeping at least some ranking/visibility, while I personally work on building quality links and helpful content.
thanks!
-
Huh! Fair enough.
-
I was searching on freedownloadhub linkexchange and happened across this thread. It look like the site has taken down all of the link exchange pages. They still return a 200 (found) response code, but have the following text:
Link Exchange Update
Due to changes in Google's ranking rules this service has become outdated. Due to a number of requests to de-list URLs, we have decided to end this service.
-
Anything with "Link Exchange" in the title should be bumped to a Spam Score 100
Those are really, really horrible links. I'd probably disavow them just to be safe. On the other hand, unless you've received a manual action notice in Google Webmaster Tools, it's quite possible those links aren't hurting you at all and Google is simply ignoring them.
On the other hand, those links are just awful.
-
...wow. Yeah, you're not kidding. Everything from the domain to "/Link-Exchange" looks so spammy as to be almost comical. If someone showed me that site, I'd tell them it's spam without hesitating.
I'm starting to lean toward killing those links, definitely. It's a tough call, though. Or at least a strange one.
-
Thanks, Matt. The strange thing is that when you plug the site into OSE, it has the spam score of 4, but on my link analysis, the scores are 8, 9, and 10.
Not to mention there are a bunch of subdomains of same page, take a look below please.. everything screams spam, but the DA and PA is what's keeping me from disavowing or removing (probably need to learn these individual terms, DA and PA, a little better). Plus my own spam score is only 2... so maybe not harming me?
http://www.xdsddwfdwwffdwd.freedownloadhub.com/Link-Exchange/browse.php?id=6
http://www.xdsddsfcwfwdwasffdwd.freedownloadhub.com/Link-Exchange/browse.php?id=6
http://www.dsessssderfeg.freedownloadhub.com/Link-Exchange/browse.php?id=6
and 10 more just like it.
Looks so crappy to me, but like you said, with a 45 DA, I'm really thinking about it. Not to mention, I really need to work on getting some quality links, but it's hard in my niche (men's sexual health)... so removing something with good rank to it, worries me.
-
Hi David!
You're getting great advice from Andy and Patrick, but I wanted to add that a site with a spam score of 4 and a DA of 45 is really unlikely to cause you a problem. Rand's initial post on spam score may clarify a bit, but we don't generally flag a link as potentially harmful until it has a score of 5.
I can't guarantee that site is _not _causing harm, but a 45 DA is reasonably solid. Really consider whether you want to risk losing any potential benefits from that link before you get rid of it.
-
Absolutely - would be worth adding Anchor Text into the mix as well.
-Andy
-
Hi there
Very true - but nofollow's do provide value and can potentially be great links.
I will add this though - thanks so much!
-
You missed a biggy Patrick - is it dofollow / nofollow
-Andy
-
Hi there
Based on what you're saying here, I would remove this link and disavow it.
The best way to assess backlinks are to ask the following questions:
-
Does this link help my website?
-
Does it send quality traffic?
-
Is this link relevant to my website?
-
Would I trust this site (that's linking to me) if I landed on it?
-
Is the website or content in which I am being linked from topically relevant to my website?
-
If you check metrics - does anything about the metrics (domain authority, page authority,Majestic, SEMRush traffic/ranking data, etc) make me feel uneasy?
-
Are the links from directory templates? (example)
-
Inspect URLs with blatant spam words
-
Free
-
Porn
-
XXX
-
Submit
-
Directory
-
Paid
-
Links
-
URL
-
Sex
-
etc.
-
Check for multiple domains and URLs on the same IPs
-
This can usually show link farms or spam
-
Don't be quick to discount nofollow links - nofollow's do provide value, so as long as they pass your sniff test, don't remove them simply because of this tag
These links don't provide any value, and the higher the spam score the more reason you have to remove it. Although, you should get second opinions from tools like Majestic, Ahrefs, and Search Console as well.
Hope this helps - good luck!
-
-
Hi David,
Spam scores like this are based on algorithms, so without seeing the links, it would be very difficult to advise correctly on this. There are other factors to take into account as well.
Would you like to PM me the information and I would be happy to take a look for you.
-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
-
Site Crawl 4xx Errors?
Hello! When I check our website's critical crawler issues with Moz Site Crawler, I'm seeing over 1000 pages with a 4xx error. All of the pages that are showing to have a 4xx error appear to be the brand and product pages we have on our website, but with /URL at the end of each permalink. For example, we have a page on our site for a brand called Davinci. The URL is https://kannakart.com/davinci/. In the site crawler, I'm seeing the 4xx for this URL: https://kannakart.com/davinci/URL. Could this be a plugin on our site that is generating these URLs? If they're going to be an issue, I'd like to remove them. However, I'm not sure exactly where to begin. Thanks in advance for the help, -Andrew
Moz Pro | | mostcg0 -
Is It Necessary to Remove The Inbound links With Spammy Score?
Hi Friends, I am new to this community. I just checked my inbound links using Moz tool and I came to know that there are some inbound links with spammy score. So, should I remove those links using disavow tool? Awaiting for the reply.
Moz Pro | | Flyin.com0 -
Open Site Explorer produces better results for www.50campfires.com than 50campfires.com
Our website url is 50campfires.com and www.50campfires.com redirects to 50campfires.com Look at the Open Site Explorer results for the two and www.50campfires.com has better results. Does google have an issue with this or may it be confusing them? We have redirects in place. How would I go about fixing this? More on what strategies would improve Page Authority and Page Rank. Thanks in Advance. 79JtBKA.png lrHwsOU.png
Moz Pro | | revonick0 -
What are Spammy Back Links
My site was hit by Penguin 2, where I lost 40% of traffic. People keep talking about spammy links but I've made none of those for my site. So how can I analyse my site and find out which links are hurting me. Can it be done with SEOMOZ software? What do I look for? I used Site Explorer and most of my links are to relevant websites. Is there a penalty for being in somebody else's blogroll even if I was added naturally and their site is a high ranking (PR4) and relevant site? All the links to my site coming from forums are no-follow. Could it be my own website? How do I check that? I have no clue what to look for. Thanks
Moz Pro | | uesat0 -
Is my Site Spam?
Recently google dropped our site a big time. Can some body tell me if my site is spammy. Our visibility was 67% and one of our top competitor had the visibility of 72%. www.aa-rental.com
Moz Pro | | tanveer10 -
When to stop link building because page authority is low - open site explorer
Hi, I'm link building with Open Site Explorer. I'm really picky in get links from only high quality sites. When do you stop going down the list of possible backlink providers because the page authority is too low. I usually stop at 40, but what do you do, why, and what does it depend on?
Moz Pro | | BobGW0 -
Tons of Crappy links in new OSE (Open Site Explorer)
I am starting to miss the old OSE. I've found that for a lot of the pages on our site, the new OSE is showing WAY more links and most of them are garbage nonsense links from China, Russia, and the rest of the internet Wild West. For instance, in the old OSE, this page used to show 9 linking domains: http://www.uncommongoods.com/gifts/by-recipient/gifts-for-him It now shows 454 links. Some of the new links (about 5 of them) are legitimate. The other 400+ are garbage. Some are porn sites, most of them don't even open a web page, they just initiate some shady download. I've seen this for other sites as well (like Urban Outfitters) This is making it much harder for me to do backlink analysis on bc I have no clue how many "Normal" links they have. Is anyone else having this problem ? Any way to filter all this crap out ? See attached screenshot of the list of links I'm getting from OSE. NHXnn
Moz Pro | | znotes1 -
Missing back links in Open Site Explorer?
I'm looking at the Open Site Explorer for my site, and it shows 9 links to my site, all from 2 domains (showing all links from all pages and for both www and not www version of my domain name). But I know for sure that there are other sites linking to my site. Are they not there because they are not important or because the links have not been crawled yet?
Moz Pro | | jsoldi0