Unnatural Linking Using Webdsite Themes
-
I am working on a website that last year received an email from Google via webmaster tools talking about the linking profile. The email suggested that the website had unnatural activity (links) and that the webmaster needed to investigate before filing for a reconsideration.
After having looked at the link profile using OSE, it was easy to see the problem. Thousands of inbound links with the exact anchor text.
Here is the BIG problem.
The tactics used by the unamed SEO agency prior to me were to embed links in to the footer of web themes? At this stage it is unclear as to where you can downlaod or purchase the web themes but it's obvious that the problem is simply going to escalate.
The domain in question is www.teamtactics.co.uk
Any thoughts on the above would be much appreciated - at this point I am trying to find the place were the themes are available for download.
Any ideas much appreciated.
shivun
-
This is a tough one. I would attack it initially like any other unnatural links project. Contact each of the sites linking to you via the footer code and ask them to remove or nofollow it. Then, document your attempts and communicate your efforts to Google.
But, the problem is that if the free templates are still available for download then you'll get more of these and could get penalized again.
I don't think it would be that hard to find these sites offering the free downloads though. According to ahrefs you've got 850 domains linking to you. If you know the anchor text used in these footers, you can narrow it down even more. Provided the sites hosting the free downloads have a demo version of the site then they'll be on that backlink list. If they don't have a demo version, there still has to be a way to do a Google search for the name of the template to find these hosts.
Then, get them to remove the template. If they don't, file a DMCA takedown request or speak to a lawyer about getting a letter written to get them to remove it.
-
HI William
Unfortunetly the website has links coming inbound from many websites now so its a problem that is only going to grow. In terms of SEO and tactics, this is a really bad strategy that has been conducted by a well known SEO agency who I won't name.
The objective is to find the source of the word press theme. Ive already contacted many of the website owners that are using the theme and are awaiting a call back.
-
Getting backlinks from sponsoring templates/themes is not the right way of doing it. People pay theme creators to include a link to their website. Other people use those themes, so you'll end up with thousands of backlinks with the same anchor text.
A good link is a link from one single page, preferably on the same niche.
What you can do at this point, is to remove all those "sponsored by", "created by" links.
Use Opensiteexplorer to analyze your website and check out who's linking to you using site wide links.
Eg.:
This theme is brought to you by Corporate Team Building Events, Fixed rate bonds rates on: http://vanzandtnews.com/
-
Wow... I'm not sure what the SEO strategy for this is, if there even is one.
If they were all coming from one domain (such as the web theme was being sold for use on their hosted sites), you could edit .htaccess to block links from that domain, but I doubt if that's the case.
As far as I know, the solution to this might be legal. If you can verifiably show that these links are damaging to your client's business, a competent lawyer could probably force them to make a reasonable effort to remove the links (provide an update web theme without the links to anyone who purchased that theme). Might not help, though.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Manual Links Vs. Smart Links
Hey Everybody, Is there any downside to the smart link plugins that I see all over wordpress? Basically in short I enter a keyword and where I want that link to go (primarily internal) and set the parameters of repetition etc and it automatically adds the link to that. Now other than the obvious situation where it might put a link in an awkward place, is there anything wrong with this sort of software? Part of me things that this sort of software would not be liked by Google, and that it isn't really getting counted as a true link, but i wanted to see if there were other thoughts or experience with this.
Link Building | | HashtagHustler0 -
Link Building
Hi Mozzers, I work for an IT company specialising in outsourcing Cisco Engineers worldwide. Due to being involved heavily in outsourcing, I'm finding it impossible to generate genuine and organic links to our website. My question is that is it essential to have back links back to our website to achieve high search engine rankings? I'm unable to get clients and other partners to provide links as we're the outsourced company,but I can get backlinks from unrelated c ompanies. For example we're running a CSR initiative with a National Gym relating to health & fitness, also links from our web designers etc... Do these links have any type of value? Any help and feedback would be greatly appreciated. Jason 🙂
Link Building | | 4Cornernetworks0 -
Thoughts on creating a resource/recommend links page in order to attain links?
Hey guys, Just wondering, how does Google view reciprocal link building nowadays? I've heard in the past that it's something that Google isn't particularly keen on. However, more recently, I've also read that - as long as the links are decent (and in moderation) - link exchanging is by no means a bad thing. The reason I ask is that I'm thinking of creating a "resource/recommended links page" for a client of mine. Because of their industry, it's really apparent that attaining links is often only possible if there is the opportunity of a reciprocal link in return. Therefore, I'd need to have a resource/recommend links page of my own. Is this something I should go ahead with to make it much easier to attain links? Or should I try to avoid reciprocal links and attempt to pinpoint one-way linking opportunities - even if they're thin on the ground? Any help much as appreciated as always. Cheers.
Link Building | | Webrevolve0 -
Is it a reciprocal Link ?
Hi, I found a great website and tought its content would be extremely interesting for our clients. I wrote about it on my blog (which has an URL with our website URL in it) , Facebook Page and even in Twitter. Meanwhile, I contacted them and offered to write an article about an interesting subject for them. They accepted and liked it so much that they decided to put 2 links for us on two of their pages. My questions are : Will this be a reciprocal link for Google? Did I make a mistake talking about them on my blog ? Did I «devaluate» the links they gave us?
Link Building | | Caru0 -
Does a hashtag link pass the same amount of link juice as a link without a hashtag?
Example 1: link to: http://www.domain.com/#something-inside-the-page Example 2: link to: http://www.domain.com/
Link Building | | adriandg0 -
In the Yahoo link directory you can submit paid or free, which do you use?
Has anyone here had any luck getting Yahoo to pickup links submitted through the free option? How long does this generally take? Or do you usually just pay the $300/year on your clients behalf? Or do you get your client to cover it? I couldn't direct link the page because you have to in a directory when you hit submit, but it looks like this screen shot: www.glitchhopforum.com/images/yahoo.png
Link Building | | adriandg0 -
External link
Hi guys! You must get many questions about external links... This is mine. If I get an external link with good authority ranking in google, but it is not relevant to the site (for example, my site is about marquees, but we could get links from schools, which are our main clients, or any type of client) Does that affect negatively somehow to the rankings? or there is good value on it even is not related? Thanks! Adriana
Link Building | | extrememarquees0