Guest Posts Triggering Penalties (16 Manual Link Penalties)

Hi

I'm new here and want to start by contributing something I've recently discovered!

I thought I'd share a little. I recently got slapped with 17 manual penalties on moneysites (not all were earning). I have quite a few test sites so it's good for learning.

I've got 15 removed so far. 2 to go.

Lots of lessons in this unfun experience. I'll update this thread with some findings. I've learnt a lot and have now started a regular link detox for my sites.

Notes:
1) I use a unique webmaster account for ALL, but I link my email to each as a user. (just like an agency would do)
2) some moneysites share an IP. Not all. Some are different servers, different NS, etc.
So the main footprint could be the office IP that may link sites as I don't use proxies to access them.

Findings So Far:
1) Just 1 link can cause a penalty.
A homepage testimonial link from one of my moneysites to another moneysite caused a penalty. (The site in question only had some branded profile links, so it was easy to isolate it to a specific link)
2) Google is onto testimonial links.
I had a few testimonial links from homepages to other sites. I removed these on some sites and the penalty got lifted. I'm 99% certain these caused penalties on some sites.
3) I bought an existing domain from a reliable provider. I restored some web archive content. Did NO linking out. Added to a webmaster and it immediately got a spam content penalty.
The site looked decent, which is weird. 15k words, nicely designed, etc.
- no spam in web archive.
- no spam in backlinks
My guess is that Google is tracking existing content in web archive and watching it carefully!
It's a popular PBN tactic to restore web archive, so it makes sense they check this.
4) 8 Other sites had homepage links from some PBNS. I removed the links and the penalties got lifted. Again, these were testimonial style homepage links.
5) One site got a penalty from a 'testimonial' link on a powerful page with only 10 other links on it. (Yes, it was one of those great finds!) The reviewer specifically signalled it out as a bad link!
6) I've recently had the reviewer isolate specific links. These are on sites that look great, have traffic. The only common factor was a link to a page for 'write for us' or 'guest posts'. I think G has a big data bank of websites that accept guest posts based on these common footprints we use to find sites!

 

Organic / natural link building will always have a different pattern. That's why they will always nail the bought link building methods.