How vital is it to get rid of spam links?

[churchwebsites]

We have about 40, between 1-4 flags. Do you see this as a problem? We looked at the disavow feature, but it seems you need to be cautious about using it. Please advise. Thanks!

[VeroBrain]

Hi,

Good question. It is highly important!

Although, there are various considerations to determine what to keep and what to disavow.
Inbound links are like letters of recommendations in the real world.

Therefore, it is perfectly natural and very important, to have recommendations from other operators in your industry/niche, universities, linkedIn accounts, as some examples.

Other natural good websites might be, serious aggregators/directories, serious websites for announce your events, high quality press, as some examples.

A second and equally important factor, is the spam score of the website. You can check with the Moz Site Explorer or the MozBar. Also highly important factors are the page authority "PA" and the domain authority "DA".

If you consider that is not relevant for your website and having high spam score, I recommend to disavow, both in Google and Bing.

Of course, it is a task that should be done carefully, studying each link, one by one and following the Webmasters recommendations from each search engine due to they are not equal.

Here is a complete guide by Marie Haynes.

Ma Verónica B.

[churchwebsites]

Thanks for your response. I checked our website spam score which is 0. So, do I really need to worry about the spam links? As I mentioned, they are between 1-4 flags, most under 4. Thanks again:-)

[VeroBrain]

You are most welcome! Ruled out the spam score, although it is important to keep an eye on them due to spam score changes over time.

A second consideration: are those inbound links damaging your website?, are they relevant to your site business/interests? For example, your website is a Corporate Bank having a lot of inbound links from gambling sites which have spam score 1, that is not a good signal, not due to the spam score, but as a bad signal for trust.

Or your website serves a community, with pizza delivery service in Canada, if having a bunch of inbound links from shoe stores in Australia, those are not relevant nor a good signal either. At the time somebody looks for a pizza, Google algorithms might decide to show other pizza delivery, instead the one with that bizarre signals related to interests and locations.

If neither of those issues are in place, as a general rule no action is necessary.

Mª Verónica B.

[GastonRiera]

Hi, 
in addition to what María said, remember to use your own and unique knowledge about your niche. Use backlink explorers such as Moz OpenSite Explorer, Ahrefs, MagesticSEO or anyone you like best. Analyze every link and if you think that it should not be part of your link profile.. Disavow them.

That's my 2cent.
Best luck!
GR.

[churchwebsites]

Thank you both for your responses. Our spam links are mainly ones back from our client's sites (which are churches/non-profits, so they seem relevant) or from blog posts I have commented on (also relevant to churches.) So, I"m not sure why they are considered spammy.

Question: Can you disavow individual links (and not the whole group of them?)

Thanks again.

[GastonRiera]

Yes you can disavow  one by one

[VeroBrain]

Hi,

As Gastón said, you can disavow one by one.

It is not considered an spam link if under 5, a reasonable amount of them and highly related to the industry/niche.

I forgot to mention a basic, that almost all active websites have as normal an spam score 1/17 - 2/17 - 3/17 up to 4/17. Even Moz has 1/17. It might be due to the site has too many inbound links and little outbound links - algorithms might see that as unnatural - it is highly probable, we do not know for sure, that the amount of inbound/outbound links should be according to other websites in the same industry and location. Although, Moz has a lot of inbound links due to is the best SEO source of knowledge and SEO tools.

If as you said, your inbound links are from clients, do not disavow them unless the spam score goes over 6 or 7.

Ma Verónica B.

[churchwebsites]

Ok, that's good to know. I think for now, I"ll leave them alone, unless there's one that seems really irrelevant. Thanks to both of you for your help.