Report: Backlink Tools Show 30% To 50% Of Your Links

Report: Backlink Tools Show 30% To 50% Of Your Links
Remember that study Eric Enge published that said Google+ has no ranking benefit? Well, part of that, Eric said that an issue with his report may be that he can't find all the links to his site.

Specifically, he estimates that 30% to 50% of the links are not reported cumulatively via both the third party tools and search engine backed tools. Specifically, he said he uses Open Site Explorer, Majestic SEO, Webmaster Tools, and Ahrefs and he thinks at best, only 50% of his links to a site are reported back.

Do you think 30-50% is accurate?
Is there even a real way for us to count all the links to a site without building our own spider and system that is guaranteed to crawl every page on the internet. Even then, you'd be unsure.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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That Google Manual Penalty May Come Back To Haunt You

That Google Manual Penalty May Come Back To Haunt You
It is not new that Google manual actions expire, it should also not be new to you that an expiration of a manual action does not mean the manual action will never return. It likely will, if you have not taken correction action.

Google suggests that you should never wait for a manual action penalty to expire, that you should take corrective action and submit a reconsideration request. But more importantly, I've seen this first hand, when manual actions expire, you notice it and then when they come back shortly after, you notice it as well.
So don't let manual actions that expire think you are safe, you may not be.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Why Build Your Own Blog Link Network???

Why Build Your Own Blog Link Network???
You'd think that after Google has penalized link network after link network that SEOs would stop asking the question of how to build links via a link network - but nope.

A WebmasterWorld thread has one senior WebmasterWorld member, wheel, detailing how he builds and monetizes his own blog link network. I guess if you can't depend on underground secret link networks, you can always try to build your own - that is until Google spots it and kills the while network.
But what Wheel describes in the thread is how he buys low cost blogs and makes a nice income off of them.

How does he do it? That is detailed in the thread. But should he do it?
Most webmasters think he is crazy for doing this. Google, time and time again, go after these link networks and to lose everything overnight is scary.
WebmasterWorld administrator, incrediBILL said, "Building a link network is fine if you can also build traffic, otherwise it's kind of a waste of time in the Penguin era."

Author: Barry Schwartz

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SEO Companies Fined For Fake Online Reviews

SEO Companies Fined For Fake Online Reviews
New York State Attorney General, Eric T. Schneiderman, announced that 19 companies have agreed to pay out a total of $350,000 in penalties for submitting fake reviews. Some of the 19 companies are SEO companies and the term "SEO" is found nine times in the formal announcement.

This was a year long investigation named "Operation Clean Turf" with the goal of finding fake consumer-reviews on websites and encouraging that practice to stop.
You need to read the section named "Undercover Investigation of "Search Engine Optimization" Companies".

It goes on an on and of course, some of these SEO companies called out with need to hire an SEO company to do reputation management for them after this.
Just another black eye for our industry.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Poking Google With Fetch Requests Won't Lead To A Penalty

Poking Google With Fetch Requests Won't Lead To A Penalty
You know that annoying kid who is constantly poking you on your back and asking the same annoying request over and over again? Well, Google said if you do that to them, at least via the Fetch as Google feature within Webmaster Tools, it won't lead to a penalty.

A Google Webmaster Help thread has one webmaster concerned that if he uses the fetch as Google feature too often, it might annoy GoogleBot too much and lead to Google ignoring his site completely.
Google's John Muller said in response, "there's no penalty for using "Fetch as Google" frequently."

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google Search Update Over The Weekend?

Google Search Update Over The Weekend?
The ongoing WebmasterWorld thread and dozens of posts in the Google Webmaster Help forum suggest that around September 20th, Google did some sort of larger update.

Let me start by saying, Google asked me nicely not to ask them on record if there was an update. So I am not going to ask Google from now on.
But based on the chatter I have seen over the weekend, it seems like there was some sort of update.

Now, looking at Mozcast, SERPs.com, Search Metrics and Algoroo, they don't show the same thing. Mozcast shows major changes on September 17th, SERPS.com shows major changes on the 18th , SERP Metrics shows changes on the 19th and Algoroo shows them on the 20th. I've never seen all four show significantly different dates for an update based on the chatter I've seen.

Some can be based on UI changes, universal search changes, geo-based changes, algorithmic changes or something else.
So it is hard to nail this one down.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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What Happens When You Disavow 35,000 Links In Google?

What Happens When You Disavow 35,000 Links In Google?
Cyrus Shepard posted on Google+ about a case study he posted on his blog about the results after he disavowed 35,000 links pointing to a site.
He said, "On April 3, 2013 I disavowed every link to my website I could find through Google Webmaster Tools." That turned out to be 35,000 links. The result in his traffic? Well, hard to say.

Here is the chart:

He said, "shortly after" he disavowed all those links, "Google released Penguin 2.0 in late May, my rankings started to drop." They dropped like a rock," he added.
Was it Penguin 2.0 that caused the drop or disavowing all the links Google knew about and thus removing all the PageRank and trust Google flowed to his site?
The only way to tell is to wait for another Penguin refresh.
The thing is, disavowing all your links that Webmaster Tools returns doesn't mean you've disavowed ALL your links. Google doesn't show all your links in webmaster tools. That being said, others have tried to disavow all their links and Google has come back to them to tell them there are still links that are pointing to them that are bad. This is why Google says use the tool with caution but like a machete.
In this case, I am not sure if these two things are 100% related.

by Barry Schwartz

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Study: Google+ Has No Direct Ranking Benefit, Like Google's Cutts Said

Study: Google+ Has No Direct Ranking Benefit, Like Google's Cutts Said
You can now stop clicking the +1 button on my articles, they have no ranking benefit.

Eric Enge published an exhaustive study named Direct Measurement of Google Plus Impact on Search Rankings. In short, Google+ has no direct impact on your Google rankings, outside of personalization and of course, getting visibility out, which has a side impact of possibly getting more links. But standalone, Google+ has no direct impact on your rankings.

Didn't we know this? Yea, Matt Cutts of Google told us time and time again - but we don't believe Matt.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google: Don't Pay The Link Mobster For Link Removals, Just Disavow Them

Google: Don't Pay The Link Mobster For Link Removals, Just Disavow Them
We have discussed people charging fees to do link removals several times but Google's John Mueller said you shouldn't have to pay for your links to be removed - instead just use the disavow tool.

In a video hangout 56 minutes and 49 seconds in, John Mueller said you he personally wouldn't pay to have a link removed. Here is the transcript of that section provided by hiswebmarketing.

So there you have it, although Google wants you to work hard to remove bad links and not just use the disavow tool. Google does not want you to pay out of pocket to have those links removed.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Take That Back: Not Every Manual Action Must Be Acted On...

Take That Back: Not Every Manual Action Must Be Acted On... 
I'll be honest, I am still confused on this. The other day, I reported on how an ex-Googler who worked in the web spam team, said that every manual action must be acted on or else the site will soon be penalized and have a negative ranking applied to it.

I honestly thought before I wrote that post that some manual actions do not lead to negative rankings. I wrote, "I tried to look back at an example of a manual action notification that I thought did not impact the site, but maybe..."
So we have a Googler and an ex-Googler suggesting two different things. So John came back in and said, "I'd recommend watching Matt's video on that specific type of manual action, he covers some corner-cases that make things a bit clearer."

So it seems John is implying that Kaspar is not wrong, because he is referencing corner-cases. However, I cannot find that specific video with the corner-case mention.
In short, it seems clearly that not ALL manual web spam notifications require an action from a webmaster. Meaning, not all notifications related to web spam are negatively impacting your site.
Or maybe, Google isn't counting some links, so removing the links won't have a negative or positive impact anyway.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google Update Reports Again: September 12th

Google Update Reports Again: September 12th 
I've received a few emails, a bunch of tweets, plus I noticed new comments on our older posts and some updates in the Webmaster World thread that signifies a possible Google update rolling out this month.
The chatter is there, so I have to report it to you.

I am not sure exactly what is going on. We saw what appeared to be a Google search update on August 21st (about 400 comments on that post) and another update on September 4th (about 600 comments on that post) and now I am seeing new chatter about an update today, this morning.

I waiting a bit to see if the monitoring tools show anything and most of them don't. Check Mozcast, SERPs.com, SERP Metrics and Algoroo. Only Moz and Algoroo are updated today and Mozcast doesn't show that high of a "temperature" reading but Algoroo does.

It is unusual to see updates in the cycle of an update, then two weeks later another update and then a week later an other update. But that is what I am seeing.
Maybe Google is working on something, I am not sure.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google's Cutts: Hit By Panda? Then Write Better Content!

Google's Cutts: Hit By Panda? Then Write Better Content!
Matt Cutts, Google's head of search spam, posted a video on what to do if you think your site may have been impacted in a bad bad way by the Panda algorithm.

In short, write better content!
Matt said your content should be as high quality as you would read in a published book or in a magazine. It should be unique, compelling and give something more to a reader.
He obviously references back to Amit Singhal blog post but doesn't really give any more guidance than what we had before.

So if you are looking for something new and unique from that video or from this post, you aren't going to get it. Well, I did make a nice animated GIF that is unique. Hope you like it.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Give Examples: Is Google Lying To Us?

Give Examples: Is Google Lying To Us?
If any of you read some of the comments left on the stuff I write here, you will see some of the anger and actual hate some webmasters have towards Google and even myself. They think that I am paid by Google to feed you things that they want you to hear and believe all in an effort to set you up and make you all fail.

A WebmasterWorld thread started by goodroi asks webmasters if they feel Google is actually giving false statements or advice? In short, is Google and more specifically, Matt Cutts, lying to SEOs and webmasters either intentionally or unintentionally, either for the good of the webmaster community or for not.

It is not good enough to say yes, Google is lying to us. You must give examples in the thread.
For example, Google told us links in press releases don't help with rankings but that was quickly disproven. Greg in the thread felt it was Google's Matt Cutts trying to steer webmasters in the right direction

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google's Matt Cutts: The Nofollow Can Only Hurt You When...

Google's Matt Cutts: The Nofollow Can Only Hurt You When...


Matt Cutts, Google's head of search spam, posted a video yesterday
on the question of, "can nofollow links hurt your site?" The answer is no but there is a "corner case."

If you absolutely spam links in a way that is so evasive and so annoying that people know you by name, then Google may take action. Even if the links are nofollowed, Google may take action against very large scale abuse of links.

It is a way for Google to go after spammers who are harming sites and encourage them not to.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google: Alright, We Will Give You One Year Worth Of Top Search Queries In Webmaster Tools

Google: Alright, We Will Give You One Year Worth Of Top Search Queries In Webmaster Tools
On Friday, Danny Sullivan reported at Search Engine Land that Google is planning to give webmasters a year worth of top search query data within webmaster tools.
Currently, Google only provides 90 days worth of this data. They do so because they stripped away the referrer data years ago, with some reporting 70%+ in [not provided] results due to this change.

So Google is finally giving in and giving webmasters at least a year worth of keyword data. Thing is, it is not perfect, it is only the top search queries, but it is better than nothing.
There is no ETA for when this will launch, but it currently is not.

Author: Barry Schwartz 

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Only 7% Claim Full Recovery From Google's Penguin 2.0 Update

Only 7% Claim Full Recovery From Google's Penguin 2.0 Update
Yesterday we covered the poll results of those impacted by Penguin 2.0 and today I wanted to share the results from our June poll asking how many of you recovered from the Penguin 2.0 update.
We had over 600 responses to the poll and 68% said they did not recover, why 17% said they partially recovered and 7% said they fully recovered. 8% said it did not apply to them.

You can compare this to our Penguin 2013 survey from the Penguin 1.0 update recoveries showing only 9% said they fully recovered. The numbers and percentages aren't all that different between 2.0 and 1.0 recovery responses.

The truth is, I don't know if Google rank any Penguin update between 2.0 and the time I ran this poll. That being said, I don't know how anyone could recover from Penguin 2.0 when Penguin hasn't be rerun by Google. Which goes to the poll disclaimer post, which talks about perception versus reality.

Here is the pie chart:

Author: Barry Schwartz

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72% Were Hit By Google's Penguin 1.0 Or 2.0 Algorithm

72% Were Hit By Google's Penguin 1.0 Or 2.0 Algorithm
Google's 2.0 Penguin update went live over 3 months ago and we ran a poll shortly after asking how many of you were impacted by this Penguin update.
We had almost 1,500 responses since launching the poll and the results were pretty significant.
The question was: How Were You Impacted By Google Penguin 2.0?
The results:

• 53% said I Was Hit By Penguin 2.0
• 19% said I Was Hit By Penguin 1.0 & Did Not Recover With Penguin 2.0
• 4% said I Recovered From Penguin 1.0
• 24% said they were not impacted by any Penguin update

 Author: Barry Schwartz

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Poll: Does A Manual Action Removal Impact Google Rankings?

Poll: Does A Manual Action Removal Impact Google Rankings? 
I see many threads with complaints, excitement, sadness and fear in the forums. Most have to do with Google rankings. It goes like this...

The webmaster says something like, "my rankings and traffic from Google tanked," now I look and I have a manual action." Few days later they come back in and claim they submitted a reconsideration request and then days later, they yell with excitement that their manual action was revoked. They then sit back and wait but nothing happens. Their traffic doesn't improve, their rankings don't increase - they are in the same boat after the manual action is revoked that they were in during the penalty. With the exception that Google says they do not have a penalty.

A few weeks ago, I spent some time chatting in a Webmaster/Search Help desk Hangout where I asked about 9 minutes into the hangout about this. I asked, how soon does it take for the traffic and rankings to return.
There is a distinction between getting the manual action revoked and then for the traffic to return. It seems like many who do get a manual action revoked still need to spend a lot of time working on getting their rankings returned.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Reports Of Another Google Update : September 4th

Reports Of Another Google Update : September 4th
I am seeing some early signs of a possible major Google update currently underway. The chatter has definitely spiked in the early morning hours of today, September 4th.

This comes shortly after an unconfirmed August 21st update. In fact, that update post has well over 250 comments and a bunch of recent ones this morning reporting the update people are seeing this morning.
The WebmasterWorld thread has two new posts this morning and I expect a lot more. Plus I see dozens of threads at Google Webmaster Help Forums with individual complaints in the past several hours.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Book Reviews Markup Comes To Google's Data Highlighter

Book Reviews Markup Comes To Google's Data Highlighter
Google launched the data highlighter tool in December to make it easier for website owners to add rich snippet data to their web pages. Google last added six new data types a few months ago to the tool and now has added support for book reviews.
Google's Pierre Far announced on Google+ that the data highlighter now officially supports book reviews markup. You can use Data Highlighter to tag data about a book, such as its title, author, reviews, and reader ratings. You can read the technical details around the support in the Google help section.
Google now officially supports 8 data types with the data highlighter. They include:

• Data Highlighter - Articles
• Data Highlighter - Book Reviews
• Data Highlighter - Events
• Data Highlighter - Local Businesses
• Data Highlighter - Movies
• Data Highlighter - Restaurants
• Data Highlighter - Software Applications
• Data Highlighter - TV Episodes

Author: Barry Schwartz

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Google's Matt Cutts Issues Subtle Warning To Ghost Networks

Google's Matt Cutts Issues Subtle Warning To Ghost Networks
Last night, Matt Cutts tweeted that he is working up several "ghost-related puns for a spam network."
I suspect they are working on targeting more and more link and spam networks and it is thus on his mind. I would think this spam topic is always on his mind, since he has been working in this area for over ten years now.
That being said, the pun he shared was "They try to look super natural, but using them will dampen your spirits."
Now, more importantly, is this a sign that Google just released yet another target aimed at another spam network? Could be.

The folks at BlackHat Forums asked if this is the time that the SAPE network of links was finally completely busted. He cited an increase in the number of complaints from SAPE link network users and how many of them have seen either manual actions in their Webmaster Tools accounts or a decrease in search traffic from Google.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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What Are Slow, Gradual Declines In Google Referrals?

What Are Slow, Gradual Declines In Google Referrals?
I see a lot of different web sites, with a lot of different problems. From manual actions, to huge drops after a major algorithm update, to hacked sites, to sites that block Google by accident. The ones that always make me wonder are the ones that aren't hit hard one night but rather see a slow but consistent decline in organic traffic from Google.

I am sure you have seen them yourself and I see thread in the Google Webmaster Help forums on this topic all the time.

Author: Barry Schwartz

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