Is it safe to 301 redirect old domain to new domain after a manual unnatural links penalty?

[Ewan.Kennedy]

I have recently taken on a client that has been manually penalised for spammy link building by two previous SEOs.

Having just read this excellent discussion,

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/lifting-a-manual-penalty-given-by-google-personal-experience

I am weighing up the odds of whether it's better to cut losses and recommend moving domains.

I had thought under these circumstances it was important not to 301 the old domain to the new domain but the author (Lewis Sellers) comments on 3/4/13 that he is aware of forwards having been implemented without transferring the penalty to the new domain.

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/lifting-a-manual-penalty-given-by-google-personal-experience#jtc216689

Is it safe to 301?

What's the latest thinking?

[garyshack]

I have seen a certain case I analysed who did 301 redirects. They were fine but I am still skeptical doing such move.

Personally, to 301 redirect a penalised site to a new domain may mean acquiring the spammy links from the old domain. I will not recommend it. If you think the old domain is no longer worth reviving then simply start a new website. This is a matter of calculating your resource spend vs benefits.

[Highforge]

We were in a similar situation and opted not top take the chance.  We started from scratch and did not 301.  Better safe than sorry.

[KarlBantleman]

The best thing would be to clean up the bad links, file a reconsideration request and then 301 the old domain to the new one...that is if you have some good links to the old domain. If you only have spammy links then starting afresh would probably be easier.

[Carson-Ward]

Hi Ewan,

This is a question that probably deserves a blog post at some point, along with a number of related questions about link-based penalties. I've been gathering info for some time, and have seem many instances of redirecting sites that have been penalized. I wish I could collect data on penalized sites more scientifically, but we work with what's available.

Manual Penalties

Manual penalties appear to carry through to new domains almost instantly when redirected to pages housing the same content. Google appears to use a number of signals to make sure that the redirect is to the same site and not to a competitor.

Some Googlers have claimed that if you received an "unnatural link" warning in WMT, it's manual. I'm not entirely convinced of this, but it's now harder than ever to differentiate between manual link-based penalties and Penguin algorithmic adjustment. That brings us to...

Refreshing Adjustments (Penalties)

Panda, Penguin, and a few other updates are a little different. We've seen instances where a user makes a big change (a complete redesign for Panda, or redirecting the entire site); the trend seems to be a brief recovery followed by a drop once the algorithm refreshes.

The obvious up-side here is that if you were going to recover from the penalty anyway, you may start to recover a bit sooner and don't have to wait for the next refresh. The downside is that it's a lot of work to do correctly, and it might be a very short-lived change.

--

Generally, I'd say it's best to clean up the site and keep going on the same domain. If you have a lot of bad links pointing to a specific page, you may want to 410 that page and start a new one, then mention this in your reconsideration request. Otherwise, it's the old process of removal (keeping notes) and using disavow if reconsideration and clean up prove insufficient.

[Ewan.Kennedy]

Hi Francis,

Thanks for your answer. From what you say, you have seen cases where redirects have been fine but you're skeptical which is a slightly mixed message.

I am aware that there might be a risk of 'infecting' the new domain. I'm just trying to get some kind of handle on the level of that risk (if that is possible).

Would you say:

1. Don't touch a 301 with a barge pole under any circumstances or

2. You should be OK under 'these circumstances' or

3. It's pot luck or

4. No need to worry about the consequences of 301s because Google will give you a fresh start. They know your motive for ditching the old domain and will filter the bad links from impacting the new domain, recognising you're a business that's been established for 1,000 years (from your business name, address, telephone number, company number etc.). Yeah, I know that last bit is probably my idealism getting the better of me.

How to quantify the risk to make the best decision?

[Ewan.Kennedy]

Hi Scott,

Thanks for your answer.

Undoubtedly the safest decision is to take no risk at all i.e. use no redirects. That might not be the decision with the most profitable expected outcome. What if you knew, with hindsight, that you could have used redirects with only a 2% probability of a minor adverse impact on the new domain? That could have been a big opportunity lost by taking the safest option..

Again, I'm trying to get away from hunches and better understand the size and nature of the risks (probably by reference to empirical data i.e. specific cases) to give the best chance of making the best decision.

[Ewan.Kennedy]

Hi Karl,

Thanks. The situation is I reckon > 90% low quality or spammy links. I estimate I might be able to get between 10% and 30% deleted with several days work but which still produces no certainty of a successful re-consideration request. There are only a handful of good links which I know I could get re-coded to a new domain. This is a small business so flogging a dead horse is precious money down the drain .

The domain is businessnamemainkeyword.com and I could host on businessname-mainkeyword.com i.e. only difference is the dash.

[Ewan.Kennedy]

Hi Carson,

Thanks for your considered reply.

I was very interested to hear your opinion about unnatural links warnings via GWT and whether they can be necessarily interpreted as manual penalties.

As usual there are conflicting opinions and the particular wording in the warning I saw is different from the wording I have seen quoted in other examples on the web. It has a feel of being slightly more tailored ... although algorithms can do tailoring!

It seems logical that Google would use an algorithmic approach wherever possible in the interests of economy and consistency but there have to be sanity checks by real people so maybe GWT emails can be triggered by algorithm or human override.

The first sentence in both your "manual penalties" and also your "refreshing adjustments" suggest to me that it might not be possible to outmanoeuvre penalties by side-stepping (domain switching).

Maybe there's also an argument here that what's best for the user should be what's best for SEO?

What's best for the user must surely be not to confuse them or change domains so maybe that's the best approach also from an SEO POV.

Oh boy. I love SEO but I think I'll do some gardening tomorrow.

[garyshack]

My skepticism is based on what I have tested myself by redirecting a single page with too many spammy links (I would say, an infected page) to a new page tanked the traffic of the website.  If you scale that, redirecting a penalised old domain to a new domain may give you the same bad result. Simple logic on my part.

I would rather work on reviving that established same old domain. Keep going. Do what you are supposed to do - clean it, brand build it further, etc.

[KarlBantleman]

Ok, you'll probably be able to get the good links for your new domain then. Good luck with it all.

[Ewan.Kennedy]

Thanks Francis, that example is useful.

[Ewan.Kennedy]

Thanks Karl.