Google slapped one of my competitors, tried to buy backlinks for 1st page seo

20 replies
  • SEO
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From the "dominate my competition files"...

For nearly a year and a half, one of my competitors was on first page google, inexplicably (he's only been in business a few years), for a top keyword (and he undoubtably made a lot from that). Doing some competitive research, I found he had hired some seo company that charges monthly fees to do backlinks etc for him, to try and artificially boost his ranking.

Google caught up with him.

Now he's buried so far down in page rankings he's gone forever. He was slapped so hard, his site would need a ladder to... (insert joke here)...

Meanwhile now I'm back on page 1 where I belong... have been page 1/2 for years. Lessons learned; do things the right way, don't try and game google, or you get what's coming to you. Gotta love it when karma catches up to the market.

-k
#1st #backlinks #buy #competitors #google #page #seo #slapped
  • Profile picture of the author AlstonA
    good piece of advice
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  • Profile picture of the author vendor
    So let me get this right
    If i hire an SEO company and pay them to put backlings to YOUR website
    will google slap you and remove you from the listings (making me jump one more slot forward?)
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    • Profile picture of the author butters
      Originally Posted by vendor View Post

      So let me get this right
      If i hire an SEO company and pay them to put backlings to YOUR website
      will google slap you and remove you from the listings (making me jump one more slot forward?)
      This is the exact reason why Google created disavow tool...

      https://support.google.com/webmaster...answer=2648487
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      • Profile picture of the author ClaireVWalker
        Originally Posted by butters View Post

        This is the exact reason why Google created disavow tool...

        https://support.google.com/webmaster...answer=2648487
        I have never heard of the disavow tool up until now, that's great! I'm guessing this is what big G implemented to stop all of the negative SEO companies that were popping up like weeds?
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      • Profile picture of the author GarrieWilson
        Originally Posted by butters View Post

        This is the exact reason why Google created disavow tool...

        https://support.google.com/webmaster...answer=2648487
        Oh so I can buy links, get ranked and then after I get slapped use the disavow tool.

        Sweet.

        Garrie
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        • Profile picture of the author John Romaine
          Originally Posted by GarrieWilson View Post

          Oh so I can buy links, get ranked and then after I get slapped use the disavow tool.

          Sweet.

          Garrie
          Not likely.

          In my experience, once a site is penalized, it's virtually impossible to get it back 100%
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          • Profile picture of the author GarrieWilson
            Originally Posted by John Romaine View Post

            Not likely.

            In my experience, once a site is penalized, it's virtually impossible to get it back 100%
            I was being sarcastic.
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          • Profile picture of the author rjames
            Originally Posted by John Romaine View Post

            Not likely.

            In my experience, once a site is penalized, it's virtually impossible to get it back 100%
            completely false...you just have to know why your site got penalized before you can recover it...most simply have no clue about SEO, therefore cant fix the problem...I bring sites back from the dead for people all the time...
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            • Profile picture of the author John Romaine
              Originally Posted by rjames View Post

              completely false...you just have to know why your site got penalized before you can recover it...most simply have no clue about SEO, therefore cant fix the problem...I bring sites back from the dead for people all the time...
              LOL.

              I seriously don't know what, or how to respond to this comment.

              Seriously.....
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              • Profile picture of the author rjames
                Originally Posted by John Romaine View Post

                LOL.

                I seriously don't know what, or how to respond to this comment.

                Seriously.....
                obviously you dont, so you shouldnt have...

                this is exactly what Im talking...95% of the people on here just have no clue. Im not trying to be rude, but it pisses me off when there are new people on here trying to learn, but are bombarded with crap information...
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                • Profile picture of the author John Romaine
                  Originally Posted by rjames View Post

                  obviously you dont, so you shouldnt have...

                  this is exactly what Im talking...95% of the people on here just have no clue. Im not trying to be rude, but it pisses me off when there are new people on here trying to learn, but are bombarded with crap information...
                  Right.

                  You're pissed off already, after just 47 posts. :rolleyes:
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                  • Profile picture of the author rjames
                    Originally Posted by John Romaine View Post

                    Right.

                    You're pissed off already, after just 47 posts. :rolleyes:
                    no...ive been trolling this crap for years...
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                    • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
                      Originally Posted by rjames View Post

                      no...ive been trolling this crap for years...
                      from the looks of it you are doing your finest work in that department right now.
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          • Profile picture of the author Shaolinsteve
            Originally Posted by John Romaine View Post

            Not likely.

            In my experience, once a site is penalized, it's virtually impossible to get it back 100%
            From my experience this has also been true. I kept an eye on several competitors when I was working for a company based around eCommerce businesses and some just disappeared of of the blue including one of ours which was due to SEO work being outsourced by a company who strongly believed "A link's a link" ergh...

            Anyway...

            I'm glad everything worked out well for you Ken!
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            • Profile picture of the author John Romaine
              Originally Posted by Shaolinsteve View Post

              From my experience this has also been true.
              Same.

              I saw an SEO firm here in Sydney that does over $600,000 a month, that got slapped big time, and even they couldn't recover.

              In addition to that I know of two high profile internet marketers that got hit, (one has his own SEO company) and he couldn't bring it back either.

              I've worked with several people, some I've helped, others I've just observed, and none have been able to fully recover. Even when manual penalties were lifted.

              There's a LOT of people running around the net "claiming" to have successfully fix a penalised site, but I'm yet to see any convincing evidence of this.
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              • Profile picture of the author rjames
                Originally Posted by John Romaine View Post

                Same.

                I saw an SEO firm here in Sydney that does over $600,000 a month, that got slapped big time, and even they couldn't recover.

                In addition to that I know of two high profile internet marketers that got hit, (one has his own SEO company) and he couldn't bring it back either.

                I've worked with several people, some I've helped, others I've just observed, and none have been able to fully recover. Even when manual penalties were lifted.

                There's a LOT of people running around the net "claiming" to have successfully fix a penalised site, but I'm yet to see any convincing evidence of this.
                well, I cant list any of my own sites that have ever been penalized as proof, because none of my sites have even been penalized...and i have hundreds of them, but SEO firms and local clients have me rescue their sites ALLLL the time because they didnt know how to build links to their site in the first place...sad really...even some huge SEO firms have no clue either...
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        • Profile picture of the author rjames
          this happened because the idiots doing the SEO do not know how to stay off the Google radar...I do my own backing linking from my own high PR sites...its the only way to stay safe and will never get slapped because Google will never slap a site for having a back link from a relevant site about your topc...but you have to know how to make the fact that you own the sites stay hidden from Google...ahhh...gotta love all the misinformation on this forum
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      • Profile picture of the author biotin
        Originally Posted by butters View Post

        This is the exact reason why Google created disavow tool...

        https://support.google.com/webmaster...answer=2648487

        Could you explain the Google penalty, and how the SEO company was involved?

        I might be wrong, but was somebody paying an SEO company to damage a competitor?
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    • Profile picture of the author Mike Anthony
      Originally Posted by vendor View Post

      So let me get this right
      If i hire an SEO company and pay them to put backlings to YOUR website
      will google slap you and remove you from the listings (making me jump one more slot forward?)
      You are doing the usual assuming there. You are assuming that the site you link to would not have any good natural links. If so then it might work (because they have very few links recommending them or they are of the same nature as what you placed) but if they have good natural links you won't tank them
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  • Profile picture of the author kencalhn
    from what I could tell, this was a relatively big firm this guy used that does the typical "hire a bunch of people in India to create backlinks" type of outfit... there's no substitute for just doing things honestly; since gaming the system doesn't work. like one guru who used to sell software that created zero-value gateway duplicate pages, many many years ago, and that was all the buzz for a year or so til it stopped working...
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