TRAFFIC
HOW TO FIGHT BACK
AGAINST A PENGUIN ATTACK
Google’s latest tool in the fi ght against spammy backlinks imposes harsh penalties on websites it views
as suspicious. Christoph C. Cemper of LinkResearchTools explains how to recover from algorithmic
penalties and says affi liates should be proactive in preventing them.
THE WEB CONSISTS OF LINKS
and Google has reiterated many times
that links are one of its top-ranking factors.
Google hates it if you try to manipulate
its search results. To prevent that Google
developed Google Penguin, which is an
automated link spam fighter.
With Google Penguin 4.0 we reached a
new evolutionary step; Google Penguin is
now in real time and granular. That means
you can get a penalty at any moment and
not just for your domain but also for any
subfolder or page. If Google thinks that
your backlink profile loo ks suspicions, it can
trigger a penalty, and suddenly your domain,
subfolder or page is just gone. And losing
your rankings means losing your traffic,
which results in a drop in conversions.
The only thing you can do is do link
audits. You need to know your backlink
profile. How many links do you have?
How strong or risky are they? Do you
already have a penalty without even
knowing it? Any website can link to your
website without your knowledge. There
is no way to prevent that. This sounds a
little dark but don’t worry, there are a few
simple steps you can take if you’re not
happy with a link to your site.
Audit your full backlink profile
The first step is to be aware of your
backlink profile and to know what power
your links have. They have the power to
get your website to the top of the search
results but also to remove you from the
search results entirely. But your awareness
is useless if you don’t look at your full
backlink profile. To only audit a fraction
of it won’t do the trick because Google sees
and evaluates them all. We just launched
the 25th link source that crawls and
verifies your site data in real time, which
is especially important in the real-time
Google Penguin era, and you would be
well advised to use a tool of this type.
Identify all the risky links
You need to evaluate all the links you have,
identify the risky ones and remove them.
Contact the webmaster to remove this
link or disavow it if you agree with this
recommendation. Available tools such our
own Link Detox will create a disavow file
for you automatically.
Google does not assume anything.
It can happen that you do a link audit and
you are shocked when you realise that your
website has spammy links. Google doesn’t
know that you don’t like those links. You
must tell it. Put those links in the disavow
file and upload it to your Google Search
Console. That is the only way that you can
communicate with Google. Unfortunately,
it can take some time for Google to recrawl
your website after you have uploaded the
disavow file. But the aforementioned tools
can force Google to recrawl your website
— sometimes this can happen as fast as
just three days.
Build Penguin-friendly links
Google Penguin likes high trust links.
Sometimes those highly trustworthy links
are easier to find than you might think.
Just check your 404 pages. Even though
everyone hates them and you do your
best to redirect them all, some always fall
through the cracks. But those 404s can have
very powerful and trustworthy links, and
with a redirect you can use those links for
your website. Check out your competitors.
Which strong and low risk links do they
have that you are still missing? Those are
the ones you should go for.
Link auditing is not a one-time thing,
it’s a continuous process and you must
do a link audit regularly. Just because you
did a full link audit once doesn’t mean the
internet stops linking to you. But believe
me, you will get into a routine, and it will
become much faster. The web changes
constantly and Google Penguin has the
power to keep up with those changes,
so you need to too.
CHRISTOPH C. CEMPER
started working in online
marketing in 2003 providing
SEO consulting and link
building services. Out of the
need for reliable and accurate
SEO software, he developed the fi rst
internal tools in 2006, which eventually
formed the basis for LinkResearchTools,
launched to the public in 2009 as a
SaaS product with four tools. It now
provides 25 tools with functionality
adapted to market requirements and
Google changes. When Google’s
Penguin update changed the rules of
SEO in 2012, Christoph launched Link
Detox, a software for fi nding risky links
in a website’s backlink profi le.
NAME: CHRISTOPH C. CEMPER
DATE: 12 JULY
WHEN: 12.30 & 14.00
iGB Affi liate Issue 63 JUN/JUL 2017
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