700,000+ Google Webmaster Messages Sent - unnatural linking Profile. What to do?

[dean1986]

Google has confirmed they have sent out of over 700,000 messages through its google webmaster interface in February. Thats more than what they sent in all of 2011.

Where does this leave us?

What have we done wrong?

What works going forward?

Im sure many business's will be left in a very bad position over this update, people will lose their jobs.

I always considered myself to be very careful with my link building as I am totally reliant on search for my business.

I think something so big requires a better explanation from google. Has SEOmoz any more info on such a big update? This really needs input from the big SEO heads.

[Michael-Goode]

Did you receive one of those GW messages?

If yes, what did it say?

[jenadams]

I guess those who didn't receive one can relax a little!

[dean1986]

Dear site owner or webmaster of xxxxxxxxx,

We've detected that some of your site's pages may be using techniques that are outside Google's Webmaster Guidelines.

Specifically, look for possibly artificial or unnatural links pointing to your site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank. Examples of unnatural linking could include buying links to pass PageRank or participating in link schemes.

We encourage you to make changes to your site so that it meets our quality guidelines. Once you've made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google's search results.

If you find unnatural links to your site that you are unable to control or remove, please provide the details in your reconsideration request.

If you have any questions about how to resolve this issue, please see our Webmaster Help Forum for support.

Sincerely,

Google Search Quality Team

I know getting the above was from participating in a service called buildmyrank. A high PR blog network. This was the only sort of thing I did that was somewhat grey hat (or so I thought) the content was always 100% and good. I have hundreds of other links that I worked really hard to get and now its practically all lost.

[dean1986]

To be honest, I dont think you should. You should be proactive and review all your link building you have done to date.

I have done this on my other websites and deleted links that might cause suspicion.

This is a rolling update they are doing, they have contact 700,000 website in Jan and Feb, SO FAR. I think not being proactive and trying to clean up your linking profile before it gets crawled could save you a lot of rankings

[NakulGoyal]

I think it's high time for every one to realize this. Unfortunately, there's no shortcut to success. The quick/manipulative link building works. Yes, you can buy links and essentially trickle through the SERPS and get into top positions. But then you are risking your website/domain/trust for long term. Think about times to come and weigh in the reward vs risk. From what I have seen, heard, a majority of this is coming from people using BuildMyRank.com Link Network. There might be others, because Google said these 700,000 messages include the manual and automatic warnings/penalties.

[dean1986]

Yes, the Majority of them is coming from Link Networks, this is what i have noticed in search for answers.

What do you recommend on then? Like Matt Cutts also announced that they were going to level the playing field and penalize websites that are over SEO'd. Whats does over SEO mean.

I ask these questions because I am now completely reviewing my SEO strategy. I want to build a long term business. But, If im going out trying to get links all day everyday, am I SEOing too much then, where do you draw the line?

[sfseo]

We had the same issue for one of our sites. We manually went through 5000+ links categorising them as

Spammy (mostly articles, link farms etc)
Low quality (reprocial links etc we built from 2004-2007 etc)
Scrapped content (content taken from our site and used on other site not related to us)
Okay/Organic (what it says on the tin)

We contacted every single on the Spammy list and ask for our links/articles to be removed. Waited a few weeks then checked again and update our list.

We then contacted google again with the list hoping for the penalty to be lifted.

Their reply was.. "There are still many inorganic links pointing to your site. Here are some examples:"
followed by a list of some of the reprocial links.

So back to going through the 1000+ Low quality links and see if we can get them removed.
Bit of a nightmare when those were links we did 5-7 years ago.

Only good thing is we still have some keywords performing well, and that our competitors are in the same boat.

[komarketingb2b]

I find it interesting that 700K+ messages were sent out. That is a lot of sites registered with GWT who may (or certainly may not) be engaging in questionable link strategies

[JamesNorquay]

Where does this leave us?

• If you have received the warning you need to go over your link profile in Google Webmaster tools, you need to remove any paid links, you need to request to remove any very low quality links or blog network links.

What have we done wrong?

• You have use paid links, over use of anchor text on links, blog networks for links, low quality links in huge numbers.

What works going forward?

• Remove all bad links then put forward a re consideration request with Google, it can take up to 4 weeks for a reply to be had.

[JamesNorquay]

I have heard similar stories, I would note the links you can not remove in the re consideration request, I would provide as much information as possible in the reconsideration request to be honest. I would name every link that you can not have remove and say you have tried your best to have it taken down.

[JamesNorquay]

Over SEO means the following:

• Building a huge amount of links with a similar anchor text.

• Over optimizing titles so they are like "Money Loans | Buy loans | Loans Texas" ect, titles need to be more natural

• Using non ethical link strategies

• Using a high percentage of the same keyword on page, key word spamming.

Overall you just need to be wise with your SEO efforts and be more natural with the SEO process.

[sfseo]

Oh we did indeed..

Exported the link profile, put all contact details for the spammy sites. Contacted them once, then waited a week. Checked again, then contacted where the links had not been removed. Waited another week. Then checked again.

After which we updated spreedsheet, uploaded to google docs and contacted google again.

You have to be seen to be making an effort.

[Guest]

This post is deleted!

[jest]

How long did it take for Google to reply?

[sfseo]

Sorry, was away for the weekend.

"There are still many inorganic links pointing to your site. Here are some examples:

http://bayside-wire-designs.com/Links.php (anchor text: Unique Collection of Celtic Wedding Rings) http://bestrings.blogspot.com/2011/08/celtic-peridot-rings.html (anchor text: Celtic Peridot Ring - Celtic Rings)"

direct from the horse's mouth.

First one is what I would consider a reciprocal link. And google seems to agree. We have requested removal/.

2nd one. Scraped content, and cant really see how they can "blame" us for that one. We will still ask for removal, but do not count of having much luck with it.

Another thing I noticed while going through the link profile.
The amount of scraped content is insane. We are talking thousands of sites/links.

I really really hope we are not told to contact those sites as well as it would prove imposible in most cases.

[sfseo]

It differs. We have had multiple emails going backward and forward. In some cases within a day or two. The last one took well over a week and a half.

Hope this helps

[jest]

Oh I see, did you get your site reconsidered ? So far you've probably made an effort of sending tens of thousands of emails probably.