16 Manual Link Penalties - A Few Tips

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!

What I've Learnt:
1) regular link detox. I'm amazed at how many scraping sites have added links to my sites that need disavowing!
2) Avoiding links on any sites that have a 'write for us' or 'guest post guidelines' page.
3) More to come!

Apologies for a short write-up. It's been a bit busy to try do a full case study and not give away all my niches & links!

I'll try add some more info when I have time but thought this might get some good discussion started.

Also - I'd like to start commenting on other threads in the forum and I have no likes

 

Some points are important and people generally do not care about it.

First bad neighborhood - Its very important because before place links must check site quality because if that website is containing any ban or stop words as keywords for related websites like adult, pharmacy etc then you can get penalty.

In case of bad links you can update google for those links also that its not created by you so google will ignore those links because if those types of links can affect site without any consideration for ranking than most of company will start bad linking for his competitors.

Your most of penalties are seems like bad neighborhood reason. If we are managing multiple sites of same themes then can link each other but not with same contents. Must use unique contents for each or let SEs know that its canonical of your parent site.

 

@RSSeosolution - I want to like your response. How do I do that? I can't find the link button anywhere!

 

Thanks ... I am also unable to find like option .... may be senior members or editors will help by give exact way to like my response.

 

@RSSeosolution - glad it's not just me! Thought I might be looking with my elbows.

 

That's a perk you get once you become an established member, all explained here:
https://www.digitalpoint.com/help/established

 

@malky66 - thanks! That makes sense.

 

'Regular link detox' isn't much necessary. Yeah, from time to time, sure. If you have a well established site then people are going to link anyway along with spammers.

And 'Write for us' blogs aren't all bad. What you suggested its a bit overkill.

 

From what I've seen on the specific links that Google flagged, many had a 'write for us' page or link in the menu! Not 100% sure but pretty sure they know these sites sell links & flag/ignore them.