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One of the intriguing things about SEO is being able to reverse engineer your competitors rankings because all the technical  information is available for those who know where to look. I recently looked at my Dashboard and saw that one of my competitors had dropped 10,000 links. The questions is why? Google algorthm change? Blackhat Penalty? Something else.? Here are the numbers, I am going to lieave my own clients site out because his numbers are pathetic. www.Leafly(dot)com   50.4k Links  Down 10k www.thcfinder(dot)com  1,530 links Down 71 www.weedmaps(dot)com 64,000k links  Up 1.5K Is it just me or is that a lot of links to loose over one indexing period?

Recently a former client of man called me up and said that his rankings for his Auto Repair Shop in Tacoma WA had dropped and he had his worst November in sales since they hired this new SEO firm to rebuild their website and provide SEO. Of course the first thing I did was check his back links and sure enough there are 22 links from Yellowbook.com all pointed to different cities I checked the SEO firms website and they and they had 4 links from YellowBook. The problem was the links from YellowBook were all optimized from different cities. I am pretty sure Google penalized my client for the unnatural back-links to YellowCrook.com. Does the community agree that these links caused the penalty? I included the links in pictures on my LinkedIn Profile.  https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/case-study-how-google-erased-60-percent-revenue-from-small-meshach?published=t Here are the links. <colgroup><col width="202"> <col width="545"></colgroup>
| http://www.yellowpages.com/seattle-wa/automotive |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/seattle-wa/auto-transmission | Auto Transmission in Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/kent-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Kent, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/seattle-wa/truck-service-repair | Truck Service Repair in Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/lower-queen-anne-seattle-wa/truck-service-repair | Truck Service Repair in Lower Queen Anne Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/bonney-lake-wa/mechanic | Mechanic in Bonney Lake, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/seattle-wa/auto-mechanics | Auto Mechanics in Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/shoreline-wa/auto-transmission | Auto Transmission in Shoreline, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/kent-wa/auto-repair | Auto Repair in Kent, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/lynnwood-wa/auto-transmission | Auto Transmission in Lynnwood, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/monroe-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Monroe, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/auburn-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Auburn, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/redmond-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Redmond, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/matthews-beach-seattle-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Matthews Beach Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/kent-wa/auto-transmission | Auto Transmission in Kent, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/monroe-wa/truck-service-repair | Truck Service Repair in Monroe, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/wilburton-bellevue-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Wilburton Bellevue, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/laurelhurst-seattle-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Laurelhurst Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/seattle-wa-98166/auto-oil-lube |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/gig-harbor-wa/auto-oil-lube | Auto Oil Lube in Gig Harbor, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/northeast-seattle-seattle-wa/auto-repair-service | Auto Repair Service in Northeast Seattle Seattle, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/auburn-wa/auto-transmission |
| http://www.yellowpages.com/burien-wa/automotive | Automotive in Burien, Washington with Reviews & Ratings - YP.com |