When to remove links

[BCB1121]

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[Andy.Drinkwater]

Hi Brant,

Absolutely. just remember to do a domain level disavow where there are multiples you wish to get rid of. Also, place a hashtag comment at the top to advise Google that you have tried to have these removed unsuccessfully.

-Andy

[MarieHaynes]

Semrush.com shows a sharp decline in rankings that started April 2012.  This was when the Penguin algorithm first rolled out.

I wouldn't worry so much about the number of links coming from each domain, but rather the quality of the domain overall.  Your site has a large number of links from bookmark sites that are probably affecting it negatively.  For example:

http://www.bookmarkshack.com/story.php?title=las-vegas-animal-hospitals

http://www.bookmarkupload.com/story.php?title=las-vegas-animal-hospitals-1

http://bookmarkdoc.com/story.php?title=-veterinary-hospital-las-vegas

Penguin was designed to knock down sites that had been cheating their way to the top.  You can escape Penguin, but there is a good chance that you won't return to your original high rankings as they were probably based on the power of links that are no longer counting (and probably working against you now.)  To escape Penguin you'll need to identify every single self made link that was made solely for SEO purposes and try to remove it.  If you can't remove it then disavow it at the domain level.  If you've done a thorough job, then the next time Penguin refreshes you may see some improvement.  But, in order to get good rankings again you'll need to find ways to attract links naturally which is not as easy as building easy links.