Questions on Google Penguin Clean-up Strategy

[DavidC.]

Hello Moz Community!

I was hit with a REAL bad penalty in May 2013, and the date corresponds to Penguin #4.  Never received a manual spam action, but the 50% drop in traffic was very apparent.  Since then, I've had a slow reduction in traffic, to where I am today... which is almost baseline.  Increases in traffic have not occurred regardless of efforts.

In researching a little more, I see that my old SEO companies built my links with exact keyterm matches, many of them repeated over and over, verbatim, on different sites.  I've heard two pieces of advice that I don't like 1) scrap the site, or 2) disavow all the links.

I would rather see if I can get the webmasters to change the link to something generic, or my brand name, before I do either of these. To scrap my site and start new will be damn near impossible because I'm in an extremely competitive niche, and my site has age (since 2007), so rather work with what I have.

A couple of questions, for folks who are in the know about this penalty, if I may:

1. This penguin update, #4, on May 22nd, was it ONLY because of the link text? Or was it also because of the link quality?  None of the updates before it harmed me, and I believe those were because of the quality?

2. Could it be for links linking from my blog to my site?  My blog (ex. www.mysite.com/blog), has close to 1,000 blog posts, and back in the days I would write these really long, keyword stuffed links leading to www.mysite.com.  I've been in the process of cleaning these up, and shortening them, and changing them to more generic (click here's), but it is a LONG and painstaking process.

3. If I get webmasters to change text to just the url or brand name, that's better than disavowing, correct?  As long the linking site has a decent spam score and PA/DA on OSE?

4. Is having SOME exact anchor text okay on these links?  Is it just the abuse that's the problem?  If so, how many should I leave? (like 5 max per keyword?) Or should I just change to the url, or disavow altogether, any and all links that have exact keyword matches?

5. I've downloaded my link profile from OSE and Majestic, and will do so from Ahrefs (I believe it is)?  Does Webmaster Tools have any section that can help give me insights into the issue?  If so, can you point me in the right direction?

6. Can I get partial credit, for some work done?  For instance, say a major update, or crawl, happens, and I've only fixed/disavowed 25% percent of the links by then, is there a possibility that I get a small boost in traffic? Or am I in the doghouse till they are all fixed?

7. Say I clean/disavow everything up, will my improvement be seen in the next crawl? Or the next Penguin update?  As there may be a substantial difference in time there.

 I see AHREFS, has some information on anchor text... any rules of thumb as to percentages of use of a certain anchor text, to see if I'm abusing or not, before I start undertaking all of this?  Thanks!

9. Could the penalty have "passed" altogether, and this is just where I rank?

Thanks guys, but the last thing I want to do is ditch my site... I will work hard on this, but need some guidance.

Much appreciated!

David

[MarieHaynes]

You're very welcome.

When I'm auditing links, I don't pay huge attention to DA and PA. You can still have unnatural links on a high DA site. But, it's often harder for a site owner to axe those links because if you're wrong, you're going to end up losing some PageRank.

With that said, links on resource pages can often be ok. If your link is relevant to the page then it may be ok. But, let's say you were a realtor and you had links on the resource page of all sorts of casino sites, baby apparel sites, exercise equipment sites, etc. then it's pretty obvious that you were just getting links wherever someone would trade a link.

The other thing to consider is scale and whether there is a link scheme going on. The Google Quality Guidelines tell us that creating resource pages solely for the purpose of linking is not a good thing. So, again, if you were a realtor and you had links from 100 other realtors and all of those realtors were linking with each other, there's a good chance that Google will see this as a link scheme. It may or may not be picked up by Penguin but I've seen sites get manual penalties for link schemes like this.

It's hard to answer the question without seeing more of the link profile, but in general, if you have a link on a resource page and it legitimately makes sense for them to be linking to you and it's not part of an elaborate link scheme then I'd keep that link. Sometimes the decisions in cases like this can be hard though.

[DavidC.]

Wow, this is great guidance, thank you Marie!

The vast majority of these links were created by an SEO company in the past... they were just doing what was the norm back then, so I can't be mad at them.

How about if the page is a decent website, with a good domain authority, page, authority, low or no spam score, but it has a resources page, and I'm one of the links?

There were some decent sites I reached out to personally in the past that still have good DA, PA, and low spam score, just with exact anchor text... would it be worth trying to keep these?

Thanks, Marie!

[MarieHaynes]

Andy's given great advice. I'll put in my two cents.

Regarding anchor text, no one really knows exactly what Penguin goes after. Up until this point it appears that keyword anchored links are the prime target for Penguin, but that could change. In Google's eyes, any link that was made primarily for SEO reasons is an unnatural link regardless of anchor text. Getting some links changed from a keyword anchor to your brand may make a difference...or it may not. No one can really say. If you have the ability to control what percentage of your anchor text is keyword anchored, then I can guarantee you that these are unnatural links.

It's also hard to give generic advice like this as every case is different. For example, if you were asking about changing keyword anchored links to brand anchored links on obvious low quality article spam sites (ezine, articlesbase and the like), I would say that this would not make any difference and you should disavow or remove these links regardless. But, if you've got valuable guest posts on authoritative sites that actually bring you real traffic and some of those have keyword anchors, then perhaps it may make sense to keep some of these and possibly change the anchor text. I'd have to say though that in most cases, if you have the power to change the anchor text, then there's a high possibility that this is an unnatural link. Ultimately, the only links that Google wants to count are ones that are earned.

If someone links to you using a keyword, it's not the keyword that makes the link unnatural. But, when I see a site that has a lot of keyword anchored links it's a red flag for me that says that there is a good chance that most of those links were made for SEO reasons and not naturally gained.

Can you make partial gains if you only clean up some of the links? Well...yes...and no...The only sites that I have seen make fantastic Penguin recoveries are ones with EXTREMELY thorough link cleanups. With that said, Penguin can hit sites to degrees. I think that it is possible that a site could clean up 80% of the link spam and see some kind of improvement but clean up 100% of the spam and see an even better improvement. The problem is though, as Andy pointed out, you have no indication from Google that tells you if you've cleaned up well. So, if Penguin refreshes and you see a mild increase in rankings, could you possibly have improved even more with further cleanup? No one knows.

In order to see improvement, the following has to happen:

1. You have to do a thorough cleanup of as many self made links as possible. If it's easy to remove them, then do so. If not, disavow. Disavow at the domain level.

2. Google has to recrawl the page that hosts your link.  This can take days, weeks, or months.

3. Penguin has to refresh or update. There is no sign of this happening soon unfortunately.

"Could the penalty have "passed" altogether, and this is just where I rank?" - Manual penalties expire. Penguin does not. Penguin is algorithmic and you'll continue to have this demotion as long as you have unnatural links pointing to your site. With that said, some sites can have links on ultra spammy directories and article sites that will die as the sites disappear from the web. It's theoretically possible to escape Penguin if enough of your bad links die off. But, if the links are still there and you haven't removed or disavowed them, then Penguin will always be an issue.

[DavidC.]

I really hope so too....

Have a great weekend,

[Andy.Drinkwater]

No worries

Matching dates will be the biggest telling signal.

I hope you get it all sorted.

-Andy

[DavidC.]

LOL!

You are right... I abused on the "couple" of questions!

Thank you!  I see a slow reduction after October, which was the last (and only refresh since the one that really hit me). Looks like there was a very minor drop there. I appreciate the answer man... I know, that was heavy

[Andy.Drinkwater]

A couple of questions, for folks who are in the know about this penalty, if I may:

A couple?

OK, first one

I've heard two pieces of advice that I don't like 1) scrap the site, or 2) disavow all the links.

If you scrap the site, you are starting from a completely clean slate. It could take you a long time to get back to where you need to be. That said, if you are stuck in Penguin, it could be a while before you see a decent recovery. You won't get out until it is run again.

This penguin update, #4, on May 22nd, was it ONLY because of the link text? Or was it also because of the link quality?  None of the updates before it harmed me, and I believe those were because of the quality?

Well, the anchor text and the link quality kinda go hand in hand a little, but it is open to debate exactly what was the primacy focus. You might be right that it was more site quality focussed and that tipped you over the edge.

Could it be for links linking from my blog to my site?  My blog (ex. www.mysite.com/blog)

No, penguin doesn't focus on internal linking. It is purely an external link metric.

If I get webmasters to change text to just the url or brand name, that's better than disavowing, correct?  As long the linking site has a decent spam score and PA/DA on OSE?

If you feel, after checking the site, that it is worth having the link, but the anchor text is spammy, then by all means, save the link.

Is having SOME exact anchor text okay on these links?  Is it just the abuse that's the problem?  If so, how many should I leave? (like 5 max per keyword?) Or should I just change to the url, or disavow altogether, any and all links that have exact keyword matches?

It's important to remember that Google wants to see a natural looking link profile. I have yet to see a profile that doesn't have a few links that are a phrase rather than just a 'click here' or 'brand'.

If you get a link from a news article in a prominent site, they are very likely to use whatever anchor text sites well within the article to benefit the reader. It is unlikely that Google is going to penalise this link because of the trust level of the source where it comes from.

Make a judgement call for links like this. If the site exists just to seed links, then even if it has a low spam score, Google might either ignore the link or set a negative mark against it.

I've downloaded my link profile from OSE and Majestic, and will do so from Ahrefs (I believe it is)?  Does Webmaster Tools have any section that can help give me insights into the issue?  If so, can you point me in the right direction?

Webmaster tools will give you a list of links, but as with any other source, it is unlikely to be every link. Get your links from OSE, Ahrefs, Majestic and Webmaster Tools and bring them all together in one spreadsheet. You are able to remove duplication at that point and get a more complete view of what is there.

Can I get partial credit, for some work done?  For instance, say a major update, or crawl, happens, and I've only fixed/disavowed 25% percent of the links by then, is there a possibility that I get a small boost in traffic? Or am I in the doghouse till they are all fixed?

No, you can get a partial recovery, right up to the point where Google takes no issue. The trouble is, you won't know when this is because it isn't a manual penalty.

Say I clean/disavow everything up, will my improvement be seen in the next crawl? Or the next Penguin update?  As there may be a substantial difference in time there.

You need to wait I'm afraid. There is no way to speed up the process sadly. Get your link profile clean and wait for the next refresh.

I see AHREFS, has some information on anchor text... any rules of thumb as to percentages of use of a certain anchor text, to see if I'm abusing or not, before I start undertaking all of this?  Thanks!

None at all. You need to be able to fully assess the profile and take a judgement call on whether or not the profile requires a clean. It sounds like it does.

Could the penalty have "passed" altogether, and this is just where I rank?

It's very possible. Check the dates of Penguin refreshes and see if they match drops in your traffic.

I'm off for a coffee now

-Andy