Google Penalized You? Me too. I responded

94 replies
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So I see a bunch of people getting penalized recently. I thought I was immune because of quality content and many natural links to my blog, but Google decided to get me also.

I could have just forgotten about it and continue on posting good content (which I will do anyway), but I also thought I would show Google that I can bite too, so I have posted my response.

Google's Hypocrisy Exposed

Basically Google just proved to me that it's easy to get a competitor penalized if you are really determined.

I am hoping that I can get this resolved and all but whatever. It seems like they nuked my homepage only but not my posts.
#google #penalized #responded
  • Profile picture of the author radivoj
    Regarding a penalty have you receive any message in your webmaster account ?
    3 weeks ago Google knock down 4 of my sites they were all ranked #1 I got message " Google Webmaster Tools notice of detected unnatural links, Specifically, look for possibly artificial or unnatural links pointing to your site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank. Examples of unnatural linking could include buying links to pass PageRank or participating in link schemes.
    We encourage you to make changes to your site so that it meets our quality guidelines. Once you've made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google's search results." ...
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by radivoj View Post

      Regarding a penalty have you receive any message in your webmaster account ?
      3 weeks ago Google knock down 4 of my sites they were all ranked #1 I got message " Google Webmaster Tools notice of detected unnatural links, Specifically, look for possibly artificial or unnatural links pointing to your site that could be intended to manipulate PageRank. Examples of unnatural linking could include buying links to pass PageRank or participating in link schemes.
      We encourage you to make changes to your site so that it meets our quality guidelines. Once you've made these changes, please submit your site for reconsideration in Google's search results." ...
      Yes I got the same message. I would like Google to explain how we are supposed to make changes lol

      My site meets their quality guidelines. I am not going to go through thousands of pages and take links down. I tried it for an hour and got nowhere.

      So basically if you send **** load of links at your competitor they will no longer meet Google's quality guidelines lol
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeWike
    Banned
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by MikeWike View Post

      What a **** ? What SEO/backlinking techniques are you using? I think you are doing something very wrong ...
      Mike, I got a lot of natural quality links (that's why Google probably wasn't able to nuke me completely) I do whatever bloggers do. I guest post, write press releases etc.

      The only links I actually pay for are from Yahoo Directory, BOTW.org and maybe few other relevant high PR web directories. (Web directories are editorial links which according to Google is ok to pay for these links)
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  • Profile picture of the author radivoj
    Yes I checked your Blog it's same thing as happen to me, alert message of unnatural links, honestly I don't know how long this is gonna last or Google is gonna make some changes regarding this big issue...
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  • Profile picture of the author MaverickUK
    You have a very small keyword to natural anchor text ratio, it isn't really too surprising that you got the message to be honest. There's a large amount of "affiliate marketing help" and "make money online" anchor texts as compared to more natural, none keyword anchor texts used.
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by MaverickUK View Post

      You have a very small keyword to natural anchor text ratio, it isn't really too surprising that you got the message to be honest. There's a large amount of "affiliate marketing help" and "make money online" anchor texts as compared to more natural, none keyword anchor texts used.
      LOL are you saying that anchor text links are not natural? or that anchor text links are bad all together? So when you do a press release and you use anchor text to link to your site it's bad? I don't think so.

      How about web directory links (which are editorial links)? They can link to your site through your anchor text if they approve it.

      Or how about guest posting? Is that black hat now?

      Again, if you have a competitor you want to nuke now we know you can.
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      • Profile picture of the author mrgood
        Well, affhelper, this reaction from Google doesn't happend for nothing. You must have some unnatural linking somewhere, maybe you buyed link packets or something else. And one more thing, this post of yours on your site is good, but do you really think that you can harm the big Google in this way? I don't think so...
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        • Profile picture of the author affhelper
          Originally Posted by mrgood View Post

          Well, affhelper, this reaction from Google doesn't happend for nothing. You must have some unnatural linking somewhere, maybe you buyed link packets or something else.
          And how do you know someone else didn't send tons of unnatural links at me?
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          • Profile picture of the author mrgood
            Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

            And how do you know someone else didn't send tons of unnatural links at me?
            This is also possible, but if you are serious webmaster, you should notice that and report it to Google.
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  • excellent post and damn right you should try to fight back and oust google for the true company that they are.

    They are without a doubt the worst of them all
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  • Profile picture of the author MaverickUK
    I'm not saying that, no. We need to think about what Google thinks, whether it be right or wrong. And yeah, it's always been possible to nuke a competitor, but you'll have a tough job doing it to sites with a lot of authority and diversity - do it to a new domain and they'll likely fall off the radar in no time at all.
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  • Profile picture of the author options
    Did you respond to google directly? We all need to get together and bite back. Well done for the post.
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by options View Post

      Did you respond to google directly? We all need to get together and bite back. Well done for the post.
      You mean applying for reconsideration? Yeah I did, but I don't feel like sitting and waiting around for months. I just said what I had to say in my post and will continue about my business.
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
    Which blog network are you using to build links?

    Before you decide to go to war with Google, you might want to take a closer look at what you were doing. You have links coming from an obvious blog network, a really poor one at that. Your articles do not look spun, but all the articles around yours are nothing but spun garbage.

    These networks, and more specifically the ones that allow spun content, are clearly in Google's sites.
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

      Which blog network are you using to build links?

      Before you decide to go to war with Google, you might want to take a closer look at what you were doing. You have links coming from an obvious blog network, a really poor one at that. Your articles do not look spun, but all the articles around yours are nothing but spun garbage.

      These networks, and more specifically the ones that allow spun content, are clearly in Google's sites.
      I have actually told Google in my reconsideration request that I have used an SEO company before but stopped a while ago. It was for a very short period of time. I concentrate on quality links not garbage.

      But I also know that a few weeks ago my blog got spammed with trackbacks from questionable sites that I had nothing to do with. At that time I was just like ...ahh who cares? I am not doing it so it can't hurt me, right?
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      • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        I have actually told Google in my reconsideration request that I have used an SEO company before but stopped a while ago. It was for a very short period of time. I concentrate on quality links not garbage.
        Unfortunately, if that is true, you are still responsible in the end. And you didn't stop that long ago. I see links as recent as the end of February.

        You won't win that reconsideration request.

        And honestly, reconsideration requests are really for manual penalties, this is algorithmic.
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        • Profile picture of the author Fernando Veloso
          Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

          Unfortunately, if that is true, you are still responsible in the end. And you didn't stop that long ago. I see links as recent as the end of February.

          You won't win that reconsideration request.

          And honestly, reconsideration requests are really for manual penalties, this is algorithmic.
          Mike, imagine it wasn't OP doing the backlink BUT a competitor.

          See where this might end? People buying fiverr gigs and reporting competitors?

          Strange times ahead...
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          • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
            Originally Posted by Fernando Veloso View Post

            Mike, imagine it wasn't OP doing the backlink BUT a competitor.

            See where this might end? People buying fiverr gigs and reporting competitors?

            Strange times ahead...
            I'm not arguing whether it was right or wrong. I'm just saying that in this case it was not a competitor, and it is easy to see what caused the drop in rankings.

            I'm not sure I would be using this example to call Google a hypocrite.
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            • Profile picture of the author affhelper
              Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

              I'm just saying that in this case it was not a competitor, and it is easy to see what caused the drop in rankings.
              Can you prove I personally did that and not someone else?

              I could just as well buy links with your anchor text and point to your site making it look like you are trying to get better rankings.
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              • Profile picture of the author airpr23
                Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

                Can you prove I personally did that and not someone else?

                I could just as well buy links with your anchor text and point to your site making it look like you are trying to get better rankings.
                Yeah exactly, and then how do you have the links removed, when they are on a different site you do not control? So if you get hit with a 10,000 forum profile backlink package or a couple of them, how are you supposed to get all 10,000 or 20,000 or 40,000 links removed? This is just dumb...
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              • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
                Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

                Can you prove I personally did that and not someone else?

                I could just as well buy links with your anchor text and point to your site making it look like you are trying to get better rankings.
                I didn't say whether it can be proven or not. You admitted to buying the links, so in this example, it is a moot point.

                You are calling Google a hypocrite, but it is kind of the pot calling the kettle black isn't it?

                If your site had not been caught doing this, would you still have written that blog post? Would you still be posting here about the "hypocrisy of Google"? Of course not.

                You got caught, you're upset about it, and I understand that. That's fine. If you want to start some campaign against Google, hey good luck.

                I would just suggest using a real example of somebody's site that got hit and didn't deserve it versus your site where you paid someone to do some piss poor backlinking and got hit for it. It would make your argument against them look more legitimate.
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                • Profile picture of the author airpr23
                  Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

                  I didn't say whether it can be proven or not. You admitted to buying the links, so in this example, it is a moot point.

                  You are calling Google a hypocrite, but it is kind of the pot calling the kettle black isn't it?

                  If your site had not been caught doing this, would you still have written that blog post? Would you still be posting here about the "hypocrisy of Google"? Of course not.

                  You got caught, you're upset about it, and I understand that. That's fine. If you want to start some campaign against Google, hey good luck.

                  I would just suggest using a real example of somebody's site that got hit and didn't deserve it versus your site where you paid someone to do some piss poor backlinking and got hit for it. It would make your argument against them look more legitimate.
                  Ok but how does Google know that he paid for those links? That's where the problem for me comes into play. Anyone can pay for low quality backlinks and point them to any site. How can Google tell who is paying for those links? They can't. And yeah I've heard this won't affect the big websites out there like Facebook, or ESPN.com but I'm pretty sure the majority of us do not have sites as big as those.

                  I don't know, I would like to think Google can't be this dumb but I've been reading a lot about people getting hit with this.

                  And even if someone pays for low quality backlinks they should just be ignored or disregarded, because it's too easy for anyone to buy crappy link packages and blast them at any site.

                  What would be interesting is if we tested this on somebody's site and blasted it. Then we could see the results. Any volunteers? LOL!
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  • Profile picture of the author Fernando Veloso
    We'll see more and more people complaining about this issue. Google grabs some sites, kicks them and there goes the neighborhood - good sites included.

    Not sure where this is going to end but... so far not looking good.
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  • Profile picture of the author airpr23
    Overall this new Google policy is just a joke. How can anyone control who is backlinking to their site? If someone buys some crappy fiverr gig with 10,000 profile links and points it towards a competitor, how can a webmaster control that? I don't know about everyone else but I'm going to start focusing on bringing in other traffic sources outside of Google. Just in case one of my sites get nuked by my competition and I get some stupid email from them. Unreal!!!
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  • Profile picture of the author orpaz191
    I advice you to choose on of the two to keep you income steady:
    1. go for quantity - build many many niche sites. if one will penalize it wont heart you that bad.
    2. Don't count on google - make a single authority website, and don't count on google for traffic. google traffic will only be a bonus.

    counting on google for traffic on a single website is risky.
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    • Profile picture of the author dcristo
      Originally Posted by orpaz191 View Post

      I advice you to choose on of the two to keep you income steady:
      1. go for quantity - build many many niche sites. if one will penalize it wont heart you that bad.
      2. Don't count on google - make a single authority website, and don't count on google for traffic. google traffic will only be a bonus.

      counting on google for traffic on a single website is risky.
      Some good points but easier said than done.

      Search traffic converts a heck of a lot better than social media traffic.

      Social media marketing is never going to be your primary marketing strategy.
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      • Profile picture of the author orpaz191
        Originally Posted by dcristo View Post

        Some good points but easier said than done.

        Search traffic converts a heck of a lot better than social media traffic.

        Social media marketing is never going to be your primary marketing strategy.
        of course but this is the difference between building a temporary money making niche sites and building a real business. let's say that even if google will shut down tomorrow, people will still but search for items on amazon or ebay.

        I believe that SEO niche site are a great way to learn the process before getting into something more serious.
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  • Profile picture of the author radivoj
    I think we should wait to see what is gonna happen, is Googe will continue harming innocents sites or they will stop and do some changes, if things continue like that then no webmaster will be safe out there, so anybody can harm your site just hitting with the spammy links and Google will penalized you, I thing Google is aware about this,hope they may make some changes in month or so there is plenty of complains at Google webmaster forum as more and more webmaster every day receiving message of detected unnatural links, will see what is gonna happen...
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    • Profile picture of the author Bluesman Of MLM
      Dude, I feel your pain, but I agree with the others here, how the heck can google tell who buys spammy links. Its weird because I was thinking about this the other day and said man any competitor can send 1000s of crappy links to my post and bam!

      And if they did, how can you really stop it?

      Sucks a$$ if you tell me
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  • Profile picture of the author Fiddy6
    I'm in the same boat as you. One of my big sites that's been online for about 4-5 yrs and has well over 6,000 posts was penalized. Rather then unnatural links pointing to my site, I was told to look for unnatural links of my site pointing to other sites. I never sold links to advertisers, although there was a lot of affiliate links that weren't clocked or blocked with a "nofollow" tag. The site went from getting over 1,000,000 hits a month to around 20,000.
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by Fiddy6 View Post

      I'm in the same boat as you. One of my big sites that's been online for about 4-5 yrs and has well over 6,000 posts was penalized. Rather then unnatural links pointing to my site, I was told to look for unnatural links of my site pointing to other sites. I never sold links to advertisers, although there was a lot of affiliate links that weren't clocked or blocked with a "nofollow" tag. The site went from getting over 1,000,000 hits a month to around 20,000.
      That's big. I always mask my affiliate links and nofollow them too. I even block Google from following them through robots.txt file.
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  • Profile picture of the author RatRaceWatch
    Ahh what do you know, I just got the same message, so I'm curious what the hell they are going to do, I'm currently being outranked by spammy, 5-15 page content websites, with typos, and garbage material.

    I've seen the backlink profiles of the top 20 of my competition, and lets just say they are all gaming googles rules, so I can't wait to see how they sabotage their search engine when I'm building an authority website with tons of pages of well-written content, a nice new original design, oh man the list goes on.

    I kind of laughed when I saw the message, I can tell google is turning into a garbage search engine so I'm not too worried about it. I'm going to take a step back, see what happens, and reorganize to stay as far away from google as humanly possible.
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    • Profile picture of the author BarryOnline
      Originally Posted by RatRaceWatch View Post

      Ahh what do you know, I just got the same message, so I'm curious what the hell they are going to do, I'm currently being outranked by spammy, 5-15 page content websites, with typos, and garbage material.

      I've seen the backlink profiles of the top 20 of my competition, and lets just say they are all gaming googles rules, so I can't wait to see how they sabotage their search engine when I'm building an authority website with tons of pages of well-written content, a nice new original design, oh man the list goes on.

      I kind of laughed when I saw the message, I can tell google is turning into a garbage search engine so I'm not too worried about it. I'm going to take a step back, see what happens, and reorganize to stay as far away from google as humanly possible.
      By sending out this "unnatural links detected" message to so many, Google has just equipped the spammers with the information needed by them to take down high quality sites.

      For the most part, who will be the people who partake in negative SEO? - Spammers! spammers, with low quality crap sites! Spammers, who will set out to take down the quality sites in there niche. Spammers, who can now flush the good sites away and flourish with their carp sites.
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      • Profile picture of the author affhelper
        Originally Posted by BarryOnline View Post

        By sending out this "unnatural links detected" message to so many, Google has just equipped the spammers with the information needed by them to take down high quality sites.

        For the most part, who will be the people who partake in negative SEO? - Spammers! spammers, with low quality crap sites! Spammers, who will set out to take down the quality sites in there niche. Spammers, who can now flush the good sites away and flourish with their carp sites.
        I did some digging around, and in some verticals I see crap pages ranked now that couldn't get to the top before. Pages with 300 words on them with generic info lol.

        I am not saying that the spammers had super quality sites before but some quality sites did also use these techniques to get their quality content to the top.
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        • Profile picture of the author PotPieGirl
          Hey all =)

          I really, really try to stay out of these types of conversations, but, once again, I can't keep my mouth shut.

          AffHelper and I have had a little conversation in my blog comments about our thoughts on Negative SEO. I'm someone who has always tried super hard to believe that Google won't nail you for things that could possibly be done TO your site/url. Instead, I wanted to believe they would just de-index/de-value the sites/urls linking to you.

          Yes, de-indexing or removing the value of those links will, in turn, most likely cause your rankings to drop since, well, you lost links. But I didn't want to believe that those links could cause a penalty to YOUR site and/or a love letter inside GWT.

          I think I might be wrong. There's another thread going on here in this part of the forum about guest posts that really opened my eyes - and, to be honest, what I *saw* really p*ssed me off.

          AffHelper might very well be right - and it's downright scary. What I saw could SO easily be done TO a competitors site/url that it makes my head spin that it seems to really work. And, to top it all of, it's using something that I feel most of us have innocently done at one time or another.

          Anyway, I'd like to add this about AffHelpers situation -

          Has anyone in this thread actually looked thru the back link profiles of the urls/sites that are still ranking strongly in his query space?

          I have... I've been tracking (uh, stalking) one of his query spaces for awhile - and when I look at the profiles of the urls that are still ranking really well, it makes my head spin that the same thing that happened to AffHelper didn't happen to ALL of them.

          We're all quick to say, "Well, you built bad links - sorry 'bout your luck, but you knew better".

          But no one has asked - why HIS site and NOT the others?

          There are spammy links OOZING out of that query space...and only a few that used to be top-ranking got hit (rankings dropped, not sure about love letters received). But there are plenty of top-ranking, and newly top-ranking urls/sites with very similar back link profiles (or WORSE back link profiles) sitting right there.

          It doesn't make sense.

          It's easy to cast judgement on one site, but when one takes a look at the top of a query space as a whole, it simply just doesn't make sense.

          Ok, that's all - sorry to interrupt.

          Oh wait, one more thing -

          @BarryOnline - that email you "sent" back to Google is SO funny! I wish someone would do that....lol!

          Jennifer
          ~PotPieGirl
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  • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
    Sorry but you really didn't bite back. You did the equivalent of going into your bathroom and yell to yourself about your ex wife or Girl friend. the only one that heard it was the neighbors. They took your site out of getting search traffic. Your posting or a thousand Internet marketers posting doesn't affect them. I posted about this "we are in a war with Google attitude here"

    http://www.warriorforum.com/adsense-...r-clothes.html


    if you have any prayer of correcting things like you say you want to how does that post help achieve your objective?
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    • Profile picture of the author Dellco
      Google is in trouble, getting hit with antitrust lawsuits, and it is not looking good at all. Adsense click values have fallen a lot in the past few months alone, and I am surprised few even bring this up here.

      Someone posted here some time back, that they know a few Google employees who are quite disgruntled and some top guys have left too. Just look at all the big changes they are doing these past few months alone. The latest one really takes the biscuit.

      I think their search engine division is in trouble. What is happening is probably an admittance that they cannot do anything about all the spam and gaming going on, so they will just adopt a nuke option.

      Google is now slapping everything and everyone, left and right....

      Maybe to some of you, Google is impregnable, but I don't think so. We could be witnessing the beginning of the end for a company that some still think of as god...I see all this wild swinging by Google as darkly ominous; when a company is experiencing trouble, they usually start making poorly thought out and bad decisions - as a reaction. And just because you were not affected, don't celebrate....you could be next.

      Maybe the Mayan 2012 thingy might have some substance to it after all...the world as we know will change this year
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      • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
        Originally Posted by Dellco View Post

        Google is in trouble, getting hit with antitrust lawsuits, and it is not looking good at all. Adsense click values have fallen a lot in the past few months alone, and I am surprised few even bring this up here.

        Someone posted here some time back, that they know a few Google employees who are quite disgruntled and some top guys have left too. Just look at all the big changes they are doing these past few months alone. The latest one really takes the biscuit.

        I think their search engine division is in trouble. What is happening is probably an admittance that they cannot do anything about all the spam and gaming going on, so they will just adopt a nuke option.

        Google is now slapping everything and everyone, left and right....

        Maybe to some of you, Google is impregnable, but I don't think so. We could be witnessing the beginning of the end for a company that some still think of as god...I see all this wild swinging by Google as darkly ominous; when a company is experiencing trouble, they usually start making poorly thought out and bad decisions - as a reaction. And just because you were not affected, don't celebrate....you could be next.

        Maybe the Mayan 2012 thingy might have some substance to it after all...the world as we know will change this year
        Interesting thoughts, it will be great to see what happens over the coming weeks and months!
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      • Profile picture of the author paulgl
        Originally Posted by Dellco View Post

        Google is in trouble, getting hit with antitrust lawsuits, and it is not looking good at all. Adsense click values have fallen a lot in the past few months alone, and I am surprised few even bring this up here.

        Someone posted here some time back, that they know a few Google employees who are quite disgruntled and some top guys have left too. Just look at all the big changes they are doing these past few months alone. The latest one really takes the biscuit.

        I think their search engine division is in trouble. What is happening is probably an admittance that they cannot do anything about all the spam and gaming going on, so they will just adopt a nuke option.

        Google is now slapping everything and everyone, left and right....

        Maybe to some of you, Google is impregnable, but I don't think so. We could be witnessing the beginning of the end for a company that some still think of as god...I see all this wild swinging by Google as darkly ominous; when a company is experiencing trouble, they usually start making poorly thought out and bad decisions - as a reaction. And just because you were not affected, don't celebrate....you could be next.

        Maybe the Mayan 2012 thingy might have some substance to it after all...the world as we know will change this year
        You need to get a grip on reality. Google had record profits.
        Why do people NEVER dis MS and their online debacle?

        Man that's rich. Dissing google for having record profits and
        doing what it takes to protect THEIR OWN business.

        Forget that they are the only competition to apple in the smartphone
        biz. And are neck and neck.

        Every big company gets hit with lawsuits on a daily basis.
        Again, nobody cares about the suits against facebook, MS, etc.

        Yahoo just sued facebook. Y A W N....

        People, I've been telling you for years now. Wake TF up.
        If you choose to let google run your life, then you also
        choose to allow them to ruin your life.

        EVERYBODY getting hit? I can't say the last time I saw zero
        search results.

        Paul
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

      Sorry but you really didn't bite back. You did the equivalent of going into your bathroom and yell to yourself about your ex wife or Girl friend. the only one that heard it was the neighbors.
      I wouldn't be so sure about that. My Alexa ranking shoot up quite a bit today
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      • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        I wouldn't be so sure about that. My Alexa ranking shoot up quite a bit today
        Maybe the ranking will come back?
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      • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        I wouldn't be so sure about that. My Alexa ranking shoot up quite a bit today
        oF course you paid for a PRweb press release that quite often gives a temporary bump in traffic but did Google cry uncle and give you back the web traffic you lost?
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        • Profile picture of the author affhelper
          Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

          oF course you paid for a PRweb press release that quite often gives a temporary bump in traffic but did Google cry uncle and give you back the web traffic you lost?
          Believe it or not I didn't lose much traffic. Maybe 10% but that post is making up for it quite well.
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          • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
            Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

            Believe it or not I didn't lose much traffic. Maybe 10% but that post is making up for it quite well.
            We both know its temporary and besides how does that bite back Google? Did their traffic drop? No. When people have burnt off their steam they will realize its all pointless. You can't demand that another site give you traffic. So burn up the energy and get the gears all hot and bothered in the end google goes on with or without you and a bunch of marketers jumping up and down as I said only makes them do high fives with each other. Its straight out encouraging them to do more like what they have been doing.

            If it didn't hurt marketers (who they see as gamers to the system) they wouldn't be crying so loudly. Far more constructive thing to do is reassess where we can improve, find alternatives and move forward with our businesses.

            I mean seriously now - You REALLY think a "make money online" is going to make them do anything but giggle when they see your protest. So vent if you must but when its time to get down to business its not about emotion and calling names - its about solutions.

            Wish you the best and you should pick up some followers so good for you but its no bite out of Google anyway you look at it
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            • Profile picture of the author affhelper
              Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

              We both know its temporary and besides how does that bite back Google? Did their traffic drop? No. When people have burnt off their steam they will realize its all pointless. You can't demand that another site give you traffic. So burn up the energy and get the gears all hot and bothered in the end google goes on with or without you and a bunch of marketers jumping up and down as I said only makes them do high fives with each other. Its straight out encouraging them to do more like what they have been doing.

              If it didn't hurt marketers (who they see as gamers to the system) they wouldn't be crying so loudly. Far more constructive thing to do is reassess where we can improve, find alternatives and move forward with our businesses.

              I mean seriously now - You REALLY think a "make money online" is going to make them do anything but giggle when they see your protest. So vent if you must but when its time to get down to business its not about emotion and calling names - its about solutions.

              Wish you the best and you should pick up some followers so good for you but its no bite out of Google anyway you look at it
              LOL I do want them to get rid off spam (all for it) but don't penalize based on links pointing to you from sites you have no control over.

              If someone else sent a ton of links to your site and it got penalized you would be protesting as well.
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              • Profile picture of the author mosthost
                Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

                LOL I do want them to get rid off spam (all for it) but don't penalize based on links pointing to you from sites you have no control over.

                If someone else sent a ton of links to your site and it got penalized you would be protesting as well.
                I hope you beat Google. I really do!
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              • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
                Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

                If someone else sent a ton of links to your site and it got penalized you would be protesting as well.
                Nobody else sent a ton of links at your site. You admitted to paying someone to do it.

                I agree that the whole getting a site penalized thing is a bit scary right now. But you look like a hypocrite leading this charge.
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                • Profile picture of the author affhelper
                  Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

                  Nobody else sent a ton of links at your site. You admitted to paying someone to do it.

                  I agree that the whole getting a site penalized thing is a bit scary right now. But you look like a hypocrite leading this charge.
                  Yeah, and I included it in my reinclusion request, but I don't think that's what triggered it. I know someone was doing something in the background sending links to my site. One day I get over 100 trackbacks to some posts and I know I was not doing it. I should have maybe reported it when it happened but seriously I don't think I should have to monitor constantly who links to me.
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  • Profile picture of the author radivoj
    Just find new update regarding Google Algorithm they said this new Google Algorithm change is going to be the biggest change in the history of Google search you can read here - Steps To Maximize Seo With New Google Algorithm - Resources - Portfolio.com
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  • Profile picture of the author PriceMaster
    My websites did disappear for certain search keywords and fell in ranking for some...

    I guess Google is upto the usual and traffic should stabilize in the coming days.
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  • Profile picture of the author namgotme
    A few of my websites just lost their keywords over night and I've done minimal backlinking. Hopefully it goes back to normal in a few days.
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  • Profile picture of the author Svetislav
    I also received a penalty for my site of detected unnatural links, i don't know why they give me a penalty one of my site was onto first page on Google for small niche kw which doesn't have a lot of competition site is over a year old and has PR 1 site was on spot #7 I haven't build any link to that site for over 6 month already and I notice that site drop on page 6 so I checked my webmaster account and I got message from Google "detected unnatural links" I don't understand why they penalized my site I haven't build any links for 6 month already...
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  • Profile picture of the author moneymoguls
    One of my blogs just get hit with the "unnatural link" crap. And of course they don't tell you which links so how do you fix it????? I have been using a PBN with varied anchor text and inner page linking and root domain. And NO SPUN crap at all.

    I have to think of another plan for traffic. Google keyword traffic is very risky.
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    Money Moguls

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      • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        According to Semrush, that blogger has over half a million back-links, call that natural? lol
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        • Profile picture of the author affhelper
          Originally Posted by seo-it-right View Post

          According to Semrush, that blogger has over half a million back-links, call that natural? lol
          I don't think that's right. According to Alexa I have like 600 links or so that count.

          Trust me, I have not gone out to get half million backlinks unless someone else did it to get me. I don't see any other explanation.

          Mostly, I do guest posting and press releases. Since when that's black hat?
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          • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
            Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

            I don't think that's right. According to Alexa I have like 600 links or so that count.

            Trust me, I have not gone out to get half million backlinks unless someone else did it to get me. I don't see any other explanation.

            Mostly, I do guest posting and press releases. Since when that's black hat?
            Then you must be the victim of a link spam attack, unless Google changes its policy there will be many more!
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            • Profile picture of the author affhelper
              Originally Posted by seo-it-right View Post

              Then you must be the victim of a link spam attack, unless Google changes its policy there will be many more!
              I agree with you. Google has opened a can of worms with this one. I already see threads on other forums where people are doing case studies targeting competitors lol.

              Bad move by Google.
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              • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
                Originally Posted by Oranges View Post

                LOL, that TP thread is looking scary for the site that will be on the receiving end. Google has been reacting like headless chicken over spam and SEO issues, and i hope that will backfire them big time.
                lol, yeah totally agree! Peeps at Google obviously read this forum and others and know what is going on, lets see if the stop the unfair dismissal of a lot of these naturally optimised sites. We shall see!
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          • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
            Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

            I don't think that's right. According to Alexa I have like 600 links or so that count.

            Trust me, I have not gone out to get half million backlinks unless someone else did it to get me. I don't see any other explanation.

            Mostly, I do guest posting and press releases. Since when that's black hat?
            Great blog though, looks like you have put plenty of work into that site!
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      • Profile picture of the author Bundberg
        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        Did you notice, Yahoo News is using Google Adsense....
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        • Profile picture of the author affhelper
          Originally Posted by StarT View Post

          Did you notice, Yahoo News is using Google Adsense....
          Nah, they use Microsoft's Adcenter
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          • Profile picture of the author Bundberg
            Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

            Nah, they use Microsoft's Adcenter
            There were banners by AdChoices when I opened this link, next time there were ads for Yahoo autos, looks like ads are in rotator.
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            • Profile picture of the author affhelper
              Originally Posted by StarT View Post

              There were banners by AdChoices when I opened this link, next time there were ads for Yahoo autos, looks like ads are in rotator.
              AdChoices doesn't mean it's from Google. Other networks adapted it as well.
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          • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
            Its all craziness and pointless. The more upset and irate Internet marketers get about this is the more Google is giving high fives to everyone else.

            https://twitter.com/#!/mattcutts/sta...92083427823616
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  • Profile picture of the author Velant
    OP, I don't think you gonna win the war by fighting back. Battling with google is just like fighting your own refelction in the mirror. I think the change in google algo is not to affect the sites that have a lot of spammy low quality links built in occasional blasts - that could definetely be used in competitor wars and would be rather stupid/careless/outrages - you name it! - of google to implement. I think they are tackling sites who have unnatural linking patterns like over-using the same anchors, links from within the same length articles and same link positioning (like many blog networks do), using the same CMS of donor sites etc. etc.etc. - anything that leaves a clear pattern over a long period of time! So quick competitor blasts to sink you down - won't work. Google is looking not only for unnatural but also for long term patterns.

    So perhaps you should anaylise your link building prehistory based on those lines and never repeat/use anything like that. I've heard from a well established SEO company serving 100's of clients that after Panda 3.3 lots of their customers have been penalised for unnatural linking patterns created as far back as 2009, 2010! So really, a lot to think about with regards to our link building strategies.

    Finally, on this misfortunate occasion perhaps the best way is to create a new site and move on, while stopping any unnatural link building for the existing site and hoping that with time it may eventually come back.
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  • Profile picture of the author steven Clayden
    looks like googles got me too, all my pages have dropped off the scale, however, i am still on page 1 for my main keyword. Strange.
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    • Profile picture of the author Amitywill
      I just lost a site that was making me $1k per week.

      You can read about it in my sig.
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      • Profile picture of the author Amitywill
        One thing I'm sure of is that manual inspections are becoming a lot more common these days which is why it's important to make sure that you follow Googles guidelines here -

        Webmaster Guidelines - Webmaster Tools Help

        And if your site is good quality and you fee like you've been
        penalised or de-indexed for no good reason then you can contact
        Google and request a reconsideration here -

        Reconsideration requests - Webmaster Tools Help

        Of course if you believe your site doesn't meet their standards
        then make the changes to your site and then contact them letting
        them know the changes you have made.

        You can get so much traffic from Google but it's time to do SEO
        in a more whitehat way if you want to stick around.

        But of course Google do need to make some real improvements
        because these big authority sites like CNN seem to be getting a free
        pass. They should have to adhere to the same value scale that
        we as "little site owners" do.


        Will
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  • Profile picture of the author mosthost
    Power to the people, brother!
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    • Profile picture of the author seo-it-right
      Originally Posted by mosthost View Post

      Power to the people, brother!
      Oh yes!
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  • Profile picture of the author kimoftheworld
    This post is an eye opener not for me, but for people who (still) think that Google is perfect and that it doesn't make mistakes.
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  • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
    You had links from a really bad blog network. I can show you the links. The sites are awful spun garbage. Some of them had articles about some new technology with a link for wrinkle cream. That kind of stuff.

    That is what did it. It wasn't trackbacks.
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    • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
      Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

      You had links from a really bad blog network. I can show you the links. The sites are awful spun garbage. Some of them had articles about some new technology with a link for wrinkle cream. That kind of stuff.

      That is what did it. It wasn't trackbacks.
      Yep and with the I am in your face post with those links the reinclusion plea is dicey. They can see those links even better than we can. I can see the "I am done with Google" I'm going elsewhere - plenty of people gave done that - but wanting a reinclusion at the same time you are biting back is the really strange bit of logic in this thread.
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      • Profile picture of the author affhelper
        Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

        Yep and with the I am in your face post with those links the reinclusion plea is dicey. They can see those links even better than we can. I can see the "I am done with Google" I'm going elsewhere - plenty of people gave done that - but wanting a reinclusion at the same time you are biting back is the really strange bit of logic in this thread.
        Mike, I don't expect Google to lift my penalty "pronto" lol I just figured I would take the time to write something about it and see where it goes. If they lift it sometime down the road then that's cool, if not I won't lose sleep over it.
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  • Profile picture of the author fenixpro
    Hmm... Funny too with a bunch of people who are versed in SEO in various ways all the sudden on their heads. Just goes to show that there really isn't a blueprint that is 100% or even 50% stable for SEO. Google can and does change things based on what they think and feel is best for the search experience.

    This might be a bit extreme, but sometimes I think it's similar to the Goverment or the Church in days past (or in other countries) that basically determines and tells the masses what is acceptable and how you will go about doing things. All the while wearing nice clean and trim clothes, smiling, and coming off as if what they are doing is in the best interest of the people and is somehow right.

    It's all relative, so they, in my mind, are not 'right'. Problem is, it doesn't matter cuz they are definitely in control!
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  • Profile picture of the author BarryOnline
    I got the "unnatural links detected" message from Google too.

    Here is my reply to the message Google sent me:

    Dear Google

    Many thanks for your message about the unnatural links that you have detected pointing to my sites. I have no idea who created these links but here is what I plan to do with the information that you have kindly provided me with.

    I now plan to set up 4 fresh sites and add Google WMT to each of them.

    I then plan to hammer each domain with an individual type of link, each of which I believe could trigger the "unnatural links detected" message you sent me and pending penalty.

    I will check the new Google WMT accounts for each site to see when the "unnatural links detected" message is triggered and on which sites. This way I will find out EXACTLY which type of links are causing the "unnatural links detected" message.

    With my findings I will then hammer every competitor site in every niche I'm in to bring as many people down with me as possible.

    Sincerely

    --------------------

    Na, I didn't really send that but it does go to show the damaging power that Google is putting into the hands of the negative SEO crowd.
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  • Profile picture of the author Architex
    How long did it take from the time you got the notice until you dropped? I got the same notice on the 18th but I have not really dropped yet. I am not sure if it is from using BMR or not. I would assume it is.
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    Architex
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by Architex View Post

      How long did it take from the time you got the notice until you dropped? I got the same notice on the 18th but I have not really dropped yet. I am not sure if it is from using BMR or not. I would assume it is.
      I didn't notice the message until I saw the drop, but it seems like there was a 2-3 week delay.
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  • Profile picture of the author RevSEO
    As others have mentioned, Google's in the hot seat here.

    But, let's be realistic, all that needs to happen is a story about a
    mom & pop's owned website that gets NUKED by a competitor and
    completely removed from Google. You know the story, they end up
    broke and on the street and Google penalized the wrong person.

    It's never been a secret that you could get a website penalized, but
    before it required an extensive budget and a long time frame. Something
    most people don't have the patience or budget to implement. Now that's
    a whole different story. I can't wait for the next New York Times article or
    Wired spread about this very topic.
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Well, Now Google replied to my message saying that my pages do not meet G's quality guidelines?!!

      So it's no longer about unnatural links?!

      Sounds like my recent post made them upset or something. Maybe they are trying to censor my blog now and are against freedom of speech.

      I don't do anything on my blog that could be considered black hat or even gray hat.

      Very interesting.
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      • Profile picture of the author chris_surfrider
        Originally Posted by affhelper View Post

        Well, Now Google replied to my message saying that my pages do not meet G's quality guidelines?!!

        So it's no longer about unnatural links?!

        Sounds like my recent post made them upset or something. Maybe they are trying to censor my blog now and are against freedom of speech.

        I don't do anything on my blog that could be considered black hat or even gray hat.

        Very interesting.
        Probably because your blog deals with affiliate marketing, which is an abomination to the phD's over at Google. Even though they have their own aff network.

        And even though AdSense is responsible for creating literally millions more low-quality sites/scraper sites than affiliate marketing ever has.

        But hey, it's okay. Because how could Google ever do something unethical or wrong?

        (Except for that one time when they got caught buying backlinks to promote Chrome... Or the time they openly admitted to Viacom that they would create a smoke/mirrors scare campaign regarding copyright infringement to force access to viral premium content... Or when they conducted a smear campaign against Bing for copying content, even though they did the same thing to Bing previously...

        And personal favorite - blatantly scraping major Branded review sites and holding them hostage: Review Sites' Rancor Rises With Prominence of Google Place Pages )

        Ahhh... what a great company.

        Affhelper, maybe if you turn your site into a complete piece of **** driven by scraping other people's content and running 8 AdSense blocks per page, 4 of which occupy the entire top-fold, you'll be re-accepted.

        Because that seems to be who's ranking well these days...

        -Chris
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        • Profile picture of the author affhelper
          Originally Posted by chris_surfrider View Post


          Affhelper, maybe if you turn your site into a complete piece of **** driven by scraping other people's content and running 8 AdSense blocks per page, 4 of which occupy the entire top-fold, you'll be re-accepted.

          Because that seems to be who's ranking well these days...

          -Chris
          LOL or blank page on blogspot - they seem to be ranking extremely well now.

          Google Panda 3.4 – Content Is No Longer Important
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  • Profile picture of the author Jordan Kovats
    I hate to state the obvious, but Google is on the blog network rampage. At some point in time, your old SEO guy must have did some of that with your site. Hence the letter, hence the penalty. To say that you can back link your competitior into oblivion...well maybe. Maybe if you blog networked you competitor last year, then they may be suffering today.

    However, to suggest you can do a 100,000 xrumer or scrapebox blast...I'm not so sure. Google knows how cheap these links are, and how readily available, and easy to implement. I believe that is why there is little value placed on them algorithmically. Besides, links are link are links, and are the foundation of the web. To destroy the foundation of the web by imposing penalties on your site by negative linkbuilding from competitiors...I doubt it will ever get to that.

    I understand that you are upset. I'd be pissed too. First at them...and then myself for trying to speed up the SEO process which too many people try to do. Let's face it, your playing their game, in their arena, with their rules. If I were you, I listen close, play nice, and play fair. And don't forget to have fun.
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  • Profile picture of the author jeffduhon
    They will eventually have to change their ways once everyone starts to hate them.
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    Bringing others with me on the way to the top!

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  • Profile picture of the author wpo1408
    12 of my sites have been accused over the last week and I have never, ever bought links or exchanged links.
    2-3 or those sites are 'brand-new' and if you check their popularity on Google with 'link:' or 'site:' the result is zero.
    So if Google's own tools (which we know are unreliable) are saying that they know of no backlinks to my sites, how can they accuse me of unnatural linking?

    That is the gist of my argument with Google.

    If you write articles with a byline and the link is the name of the site and the name of the page most relevant to that article, and the article is used a lot, it stands to reaon that the number or different anchor texts will be limited, or not?

    If you take an article from, say, EA, you are not allowed to just alter the achor text to whatever you like.

    Owen.
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  • Profile picture of the author JJP
    Personally, I would cower to the might of Google and avoid a penalty. But I like that someone else wouldn't!
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    • Profile picture of the author MaroshIS
      Complains from us marketers will do no harm to Big G since their profits are rising constantly from Adwords and that's all they care of. Look, Google can even survive if all search queries on first page will show only authority sites like Wikipedia, Ask, Yahoo answers etc...

      What I want to say by this, stop complaining, do not answer GWT message and find new traffic sources before it's too late!
      Don't let that evil company destroy your life.

      I wonder if any of old authority high PR sites got this message in GWT also ?
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    • Profile picture of the author wpo1408
      Originally Posted by JJP View Post

      Personally, I would cower to the might of Google and avoid a penalty. But I like that someone else wouldn't!
      How do you avoid a penalty if you don't know what the penalty is for?
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    • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
      Originally Posted by JJP View Post

      Personally, I would cower to the might of Google and avoid a penalty. But I like that someone else wouldn't!
      You can take a stand on the basis of something you didn't do and was accused wrongfully of but once you admit to doing the thing (having links, "testing" them out on you money site not a test site) its really not a positive that you can't admit you may have some responsibility.

      I know people will hate the point but how can Google be hypocritical for giving you a penalty when you admit for whatever reason to have done what they accuse you of doing? Makes absolutely zero sense.

      Call them evil, gestapos a pile of other things but once you admit to knowing and even paying for the links the hypocrisy claim just does not stand up to scrutiny.
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      • Profile picture of the author Amitywill
        Originally Posted by Mike Anthony View Post

        You can take a stand on the basis of something you didn't do and was accused wrongfully of but once you admit to doing the thing (having links, "testing" them out on you money site not a test site) its really not a positive that you can't admit you may have some responsibility.

        I know people will hate the point but how can Google be hypocritical for giving you a penalty when you admit for whatever reason to have done what they accuse you of doing? Makes absolutely zero sense.

        Call them evil, gestapos a pile of other things but once you admit to knowing and even paying for the links the hypocrisy claim just does not stand up to scrutiny.
        Spot on, and to be honest it's a waste of time in my opinion
        caring about how hypocritical Google is. They don't care what
        we as webmasters think about them. At the end of the day
        they're the ones providing us with traffic not the other way round.

        Yes they may tell us to do one thing whilst they do something
        else but that's something that's not gonna change so we might
        as well just accept it and get over it.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    I've tried to tell people not to reply to those automated messages, their just creating problems for no reason.

    I haven't had the message in my GWT, but If I did, I would simply ignore the message so long as my pages are still in the SERPs.

    If your pages are still indexed you can recover a SERP position.

    Or you can keep farting around with automated messages.
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  • Profile picture of the author yukon
    Banned
    Why don't one of you guys that have the GWT message test this (in this exact order):

    1) Delete the site profile inside GWT
    2) Remove the GWT site verification code from the site
    3) Clear the browser history (CCleaner - Free)
    4) Create a new GWT profile for the same site
    5) Add the new GWT site verification code to the site

    See If the same message comes back to the new GWT profile.

    Can't hurt & beats asking the same question on a forum 100 times.
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    • Profile picture of the author affhelper
      Originally Posted by yukon View Post

      Why don't one of you guys that have the GWT message test this (in this exact order):

      1) Delete the site profile inside GWT
      2) Remove the GWT site verification code from the site
      3) Clear the browser history (CCleaner - Free)
      4) Create a new GWT profile for the same site
      5) Add the new GWT site verification code to the site

      See If the same message comes back to the new GWT profile.

      Can't hurt & beats asking the same question on a forum 100 times.
      That won't work. It doesn't matter if you use GWT or not. It's not like they can't crawl or see your link profile without it.
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