Around 10% of our backlink profile is made up of branded links from one Japanese site, do we disavow?

[cttgroup]

We have recently changed domain names and all the links are going to the old domain. We are wondering whether we should disavow them all as they are the majority of our backlink profile at the moment.

[Andy.Drinkwater]

The general rule of thumb is only disavow if you have had a warning from Google or if you know the links to be dodgy. In this case, would you not be able to get in touch with the site in question and ask them to change the links?

Andy

[cttgroup]

We haven't had a warning from Google. The site is completely in Japanese and Google Translate doesn't work on the site so can't find a place to contact the owner to ask them to change the links.

[Andy.Drinkwater]

Well, unless there is a reason to believe the site to be spammy or have caused you problems, I wouldn't worry about it. You might be disavowing a site with no real cause to.

[TomRayner]

Just to clarify Laurence - you've moved to a new domain and on this new domain are the Japanese links?

I'm of the school of thought that you should only use the disavow tool when asked to.  By this, I mean that you shouldn't be proactive in disavowing suspicious links, unless you have been explicitly asked by Google to do so as part of an unnatural links warning penalty.  Google is pretty explicit in saying that you should only use the disavow tool as a last resort if you cannot get the links removed by contacting the webmaster.

I also think that Google is moving towards the direction of devaluing low-quality links on the fly, as per this article.  I can't imagine that these links would be anything other than that and so, for that combination of reasons, I'd leave the links be.

By all means, keep a note of the URLs if anything should happen in the future, but I think you'd be much better off by building your own links and brand persona with an inbound marketing strategy, rather than potentially wasting time removing links that may have already (or soon to be) devalued.

[cttgroup]

Ok thanks I think we will just left it. Thank you for your help!

[cttgroup]

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