Google made it more difficult

In 2012, Google produced a groundbreaking algorithm for counteracting link spamming known as Google Penguin, which caused a major transformation. Suddenly, all these cheap and spammy tactics stopped working. The Internet that we once knew has disappeared forever. A huge number of sites experienced a decrease in their ratings and visibility.

The concept of Negative SEO was in existence prior to the launch of Google’s Penguin algorithm. However, there was no need for it. If you desired to elevate your own standing, there was no requirement to demolish your adversary. You had to secure the victory against him by purchasing additional backlinks. In the past, Google rarely issued punishments to websites.

The success of Google’s Penguin Update spurred the growth of a wicked industry.

The onset of Google Penguin was the catalyst for launching search engine optimization activities of a deleterious nature.

SEO is now a painstaking work…

At last, Google put an end to any kind of tactics that allowed for the quick and easy acquisition of backlinks. This was the first occasion they necessitated website administrators to develop material with the users in mind, not just the calculations.

In theory, SEO should be a very natural process. Your site should provide a great user experience. Your unique and high-quality content should attract visitors. Spread it across the web and have your followers join your social media accounts. This will take some time, but eventually you will succeed. Well, guess what?

Many webmasters and their supervisors who are in a rush have this opinion. You don’t have much time, so the pressure you feel is intense.

Why is Negative SEO such a big threat?

There are multiple reasons:

• Negative SEO is easier, cheaper, faster and more efficient than natural SEO
• Attackers are experienced SEOs who know what they are doing
• Google can protect you from some sneaky tricks, but just have in mind that negative SEO can spread over a longer period and use really complex techniques to bring down a website for good

What Google says about negative SEO

It would appear that Google strives to make all the possible attempts to guard us from destructive SEO, but the query which really must be posed is how effective are their measures?

In 2001, Google’s official statement was:

No one can do anything to adversely impact your position in the rankings or get your website taken out of our search engine.

In 2003, they changed that statement to:

. It is almost impossible for a rival to hurt your position in our index or to have your site taken out.

Today, Google’s official statement looks like this:

Google puts in a lot of effort to protect webmasters from having their site ranking adversely affected or taken out of the search engine index. If you are apprehensive about a different website linking to yours, we advise that you communicate with the manager of the site in question. Google gathers and sorts data that has been posted online; we aren’t responsible for the content on these pages.

It would be unfair to declare this an absolute win for Google, yet they did recognize that negative SEO techniques can be used.

Different negative SEO techniques

1. Bad backlink

When an individual is hoping to wreck your standings, their first attempt may be to send you a large number of low-quality, unwanted, economical and computer-generated backlinks from dormant web logs, discussion boards, and websites. The range of possibilities is unfortunately very wide.

A large rise in the number of links within a brief timeframe could be a sign of negative search engine optimization. It is important to monitor your link development frequently. Utilizing tools such as CLV (Competitive Link Velocity) can assist you in comprehending the accepted level in your specific field.

The silver lining is that Google is likely to safeguard you in the event that they discover that the number is extremely high. If the quantity of backlinks looks decent and the development continues to be steady, Google may think that it is an intentional attempt to increase your rankings through paid connections – and this may almost certainly lead to a Penalty. This explains why companies such as William Hill and Expedia were sanctioned.

2. Unbalanced link ratio

The main concern in search engine optimization is not whether to have beneficial or detrimental backlinks, Follow or No Follow links, Money or Brand words. Maintaining a natural balance in your backlink profile is important.

It is not a huge issue if some of your backlinks are of poor quality as long as you have a sufficient quantity of good links to make up for it. That’s exactly what Google’s John Mueller was talking about in this video:

It is acceptable to have sitewide links, however, it is not appropriate if the majority (80%) of your external links are site-wide. It is alright to go after certain Money Keywords, however, Google may punish you if the majority of your keywords are Money Keywords. Why? Because it is not natural!

Any discrepancy from an organic mixture of your inbound links can be a sign of a breach of the Google quality standards, which may cause a Penalty and result in reduced visibility. These rates vary by country, language and industry. The CLA is the only resource that can assist you in determining the accepted standards in your particular field.

3. Penalty redirections

Many webmasters attempted to resolve a Penalty issue simply by relocating a website to another web address and directing URLs to that newest domain. This is an intriguing concept, yet Google doesn’t permit it, so they simply shifted the Penalty to the new spot.

This presents an issue when someone deliberately exploits this and directs a website that is subject to a penalty to yours. In these circumstances, Google could impose sanctions on your website.

4. Content scraping

The effectiveness of content for improving website rankings on Google is indisputable – content of superior quality that is capable of providing users with great value will always be the foremost criteria for successful optimization. Coming up with quality content can be a challenging task, and it can take as long as a few days or weeks to compose a good piece of writing. And once it’s published, everybody can copy it. Rest assured that Google has already explored and indexed your website, so other search engines or websites will be recognised as nothing but plagiarists.

What would happen if a person chose to keep scanning your site without stopping and afterwards put all your new content on another website? Google may be able to canvas the website prior to yours, resulting in all of your hard labor going to waste. Illegal though it may be, content scraping is a common activity carried out on the web.

5. Removing good links

It may seem improbable or inconceivable, but somebody could examine your backlink portfolio, pinpoint your most robust and beneficial backlinks, and then reach out to the site owners asking them to take those connections away. They might phone in with a different identity, impersonate you or claiming to be an SEO firm hired by you. David Naylor conducted a scary experiment and discovered that a huge percentage of webmasters had taken down the links!

7 Tips to Protect Your Site From Negative SEO

In case you have been affected, suspecting it, or want to secure yourself from potential strikes, here are 7 strategies that can help guard your website from being a target of Negative SEO.

1. Perform Regular Link Audits

Carrying out regular inspections of your links is recommended for any business, but can be particularly vital if your site ever gets targeted by a malicious negative SEO strategy. Keeping an eye on how your link profile expands is indisputably the most effective way of noticing dubious activity before it becomes too difficult to manage.

Your links might also suffer if you’ve been hacked. It is conceivable that the assailant has adjusted your material to embed spammy connections or changed your connections to point to their own. Fending off these kinds of attacks can be tricky, and the only way to protect your website is to inspect it frequently.

It is of the utmost importance to watch over your link profile progression carefully in order to stop an attack before it costs too much. Examine your backlinks utilizing either a link auditing tool or a manual audit to make sure they are in good shape. If link farm spamming has been done to you, inform Google of this and cancel the links as soon as possible.

2. Keep an Eye on Your Site Speed

Site speed is a key ranking factor. In case your website is performing poorly and you have no clue why, consider employing a crawling program to look for anything out of the ordinary.

In the event that you are unable to locate a solution to your issue and it persists, it is possible that you are being subjected to forceful web crawling. The strenuous activity of web crawling stresses the server, resulting in a slower and potentially fragile website.

If you feel that you are the target of a crawling attack, you should reach out to your website hosting provider or webmaster to investigate the source of the load. If you’re knowledgeable with technology, you can also attempt to find out who is responsible by yourself.

3. Search for Scraped Content

Content production has been the predominant trend in recent times, yet having a natural ability to create content is not a common trait. Consequently, scraping has become all too frequent.

Retrieving information from a website and reproducing it in identical form on a different site is known as scraping. Frequently, a cracker will lay claim to the content to make their material thicker, but occasionally they’ll bunch it with a link farm campaign to inundate your website.

Scraping has serious consequences. If the copy appears on a search engine earlier than your page, it could diminish its value, potentially leading to a drop in the ranking of the site.

4. Monitor Google My Business

You strive to create a positive image for your company and acquire customers. Unfavorable comments can be painful, but it is typically beneficial to take them as an opportunity to figure out methods to become better. But what about a tidal wave of negative reviews?

In the event that you have not caused a major public relations catastrophe recently, a large number of unfavourable reviews could be an indication that someone is trying to overwhelm your website with fake reviews. You have to act rapidly, as these can substantially harm your standing.

Here’s how you flag and report fake reviews:

1. Search for your business on Google Maps.
2. Select your business from the search results.
3. Click Review Summary > # Reviews in the left panel.
4. Flag the fake reviews.
5. Fill out the report form.

5. Watch Your Keywords’ CTR

In late 2014, Bartosz Goralewicz observed something odd – a customer’s webpage was getting loads of visits that would arrive at the webpage and then immediately leave. Their placements were impacted by this, since user experience is seen as a significant factor and it seemed unpromising in terms of UX.

Someone was using a bot to find specific keywords, land on websites of competitors and quickly leave, which was creating a misrepresentation of the SERP (Search Engine Results Page) bounce rate.

It can be hard to detect this devious assault if you are not paying attention to the CTR of your key phrases. To access Google Search Console, log in, navigate to Search Traffic, and click on Search Analytics. Analyze the click-through rate (CTR) across all of the keywords. If you see a sudden, unexplained increase in traffic, reach out to Google and begin the process of rejecting the links that could be responsible.

6. Check Your SERP Ranking

It’s a good idea to routinely check your SERP rankings since a decrease may be precipitated by intentional bad faith. Fortunately, unsuccessful attempts of de-indexing due to hackers rarely occur. However, I have heard numerous troubling tales of unethical SEOs who amended their past clients’ robots.txt file to state “Disallow: /” after their parting of ways.

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