Google launches their Disallow Tool
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Awesome tool. How can I tell which links to my site I should disavow? We get a bunch of random links per day that look spammy, but how can I tell for sure that removing them will help rather than hurt?
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Really looking forward to this tool... But Joeys question is Really important. Does anyone have suggestions?
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Thanks for the heads up. Just watched the video.
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Cutt's did not indicate how to download the tool. Did I miss that?
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The links are in the YouTube video description.
"Access the feature here:
https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/disavow-links-main" -
Based on what Matt said, it sounds like Google only wants you to use the tool for links that you've tried to remove manually but couldn't. My guess is they may ignore your disavowals if you rely too much on the tool.
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Nice summary at SEWatch:
http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2217602/Google-Disavow-Links-Tool-Now-Available
I'm curious about the "Most sites shouldn’t use this tool,” Cutts said. “Use caution." caveat. I've basically got only one client out of many that I'd even need to consider using this for. But I can't help but imagine hyper paranoid SEOs trying to massage their link profile down to the last drop of relevance. My gut feel is that this is a 'last resort' tool, and not a 'everyday SEO' tool.
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Thanks for opening this discussion Irving. I have had calls from clients today regarding this "change" and it seems many site owners are simply caught up in the idea without realizing the true impact of this change. Resolving a manual Google penalty for manipulative links involves 4 steps prior to the release of this tool:
1. Compile a comprehensive backlink report. Many sites which suffer from a manipulative link penalty are absolutely doomed to have their Reconsideration Requests declined before they are even submitted. Why? Because they have not captured all the links to their site. You cannot rely on any single tool or even 2 tool combination. For each client I work with we compile a list of every known backlink to their site. How? By combining Google + Bing + OSE + Majestic + AHREFs data. Each data source offers links the others do not seem to find.
2. Properly identify all the manipulative links to the target site. Once again, many site owners repeatedly fail their Reconsideration Request and have no real chance at success because they try to take the easy way out. Attempting to replace real effort with fake work is what caused the penalty in the first place.
a. A thorough understanding of the difference between an organic link and manipulative link is required. In short, you must calibrate your understanding of links to match Google. How do you view free directory links? The reality is 99%+ of them are manipulative. How about press releases? Do you think most press releases are organic links? When site owners pay another company to publish articles they wrote with links back to their site, does that sound natural to you?
b. How about broken links? Can you use an automatic link checker and then if the link is not on the URL simply cross it off the list? In a significant percent of cases the link has simply moved to another page on the linking site. Some sites have very dynamic link structures where one day a URL is at ?page=20 and the next it is at ?page=21. Other sites make URL changes over time. You must search each site using their search widget and a Google site: search before assuming the site's link is gone.
c. Is the link marked NoFollow? You need to keep searching the page to ensure there are not other followed links on the same page.
The above are just some examples of gaps in the process of many who attempt to resolve this type of penalty. The disavow tool's introduction does not impact this step.
3. Webmaster Outreach. Once you have a comprehensive list of all known links to your site and have properly identified all the manipulative links, there is a need to contact every site on the list. Another common issue is those attempting to resolving a manipulative link issue give up far too easy. Site owners can be contacted via their WHOIS email address, the email address on their site AND the contact form on their site. You can call them, send a letter and chase them down on social networks. This type of sincere effort can lead to 50%+ reduction in links to your site.
Once sincere and comprehensive efforts have been made to remove the links, Google can clearly tell because there will be a "significant" reduction in manipulative links. At that point, THEN the Disavow tool can be used.
4. Filing a thoroughly documented Reconsideration Request. Three days later, the Reconsideration Request can be submitted.
So the introduction of this tool actually did not reduce any step in the process at all. Matt clearly outlined Google's expectation the tool is only used after a webmaster outreach campaign has been completed. If you expect to be able to simply submit a list of links without webmaster outreach, you are likely going to be disappointed.
Watch the first 2 minutes of the video a few times. Matt clearly says "...when you have contacted each webmaster multiple times....and there are only a small fraction of links left....that is when you can use the tool."
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You are so right Ryan! This tool is not a shortcut at all. I fear that a lot of webmasters who have an unnatural links warning are going to jump straight to the disavow tool and ignore the actual reconsideration request process. As Matt says in the video, you still need to make a thorough attempt at trying to get the links removed on your own in order to have a manual penalty revoked.
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Nice write-up Ryan, thanks.
Looks like an aggressive tool, I can see a lot of Webmasters running into trouble with this one.
If you contact a blog to get a link removed and then realise after actually I have made a mistake, or you login to a directory and remove it yourself and realise after you have made a mistake you can work on getting it back.
I get the feeling if you don't go through the process Ryan put down and you make a mistake with the Disallow Tool you wont be able to get those links back.
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Long time comming and quiite a messy interface. why they could not do somthing like Bing did with there tool is a mystery.
I have a client with a unatural link warning, saying "for this specific incident we are taking very targeted action on the unnatural links instead of your site as a whole"
to me this sounds like these links have been discounted anyhow and that the site is not punished, and maybe no need to do anything, but then goes on to say "If you are able to remove any of the links, please submit a reconsideration request, including the actions that you took."
so that makes me think i do need to do something. not very clear.
This client has a lot of very good links from CNN, NYT and a host of others, but partisipated in a link wheel. The blogs in this link wheel are real blogs rather than your obvious mass made for links blogs and makes it hard to identify what are what. i am thinking to disavow anything thats could be doggy, he has such good links I think it better to have a few false positives rather then leave any bad links in the profile.
Back to my first point, i was hoping for a click and job done approch link in BWMT.
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Very solid analysis Ryan, good stuff.
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Excellent sir.
We will know pretty soon how everything shakes out once people start reporting back, but my suggestion would be that if you have a site that is not penalized you should NOT use this tool as an effort to try and clean up any spammy back links and clean up your good-to-bad backlink ratio. The reason is, this is a tool to be used as a last effort in trying to come back from a penalty when there are some links you tried to remove but simply cannot.
Sending this report will put eyeballs on your site and bring unnecessary attention to your site. Why ask Google to review your backlink profile and look at the nastiest links pointing to your site if your site is currently healthy.
An exception to this rule I think would be if you notice you are clearly under a negative SEO attack. Then it would make sense to be proactive.
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This says to me that your site was spared an across the board penalty, but your rankings for specific keywords that have been overused in your anchor text have been suppressed. I would look at your incoming link anchor texts and see which one(s) you are no longer ranking for.
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Thanks... Should have read the YouTube description.
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Very busy with a new project out of Arizona.
i have been following Mitt closely. He might just get over the line.
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The damage was done before i came on the picture and there is no stats from before. the site rangs below other sites owned by the same clent with much weaker linking profiles. As i mentioend the site has the best of links, this is why i am prepared to get rid of any links that look even the slightest doggy. The site should rank number 1 when you look at the competition
I just dont have the time or budget to try to ask for removal, a attemp was made long ago with no sucess.
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This is gonna be interesting how everything works out.
I've sent a reconsideration request a day or two prior to the release. I will see how that request goes and then update the spreadsheet with new links I've removed as well as using disavow.
So far my webmaster response is about 10%, so you have no idea how much this tool can relieve some pain after so many attempts.
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