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Hi there,

In any case I would not expect a lot of traffic to posts that are syndicated. Generally people use syndicated content to supplement what's already there. So if the idea is to get more traffic through these posts, I would suggest finding another way.

Having said that, my understanding is that syndication-source still works, but canonical will override it. If you have something that says they no longer recognize it I have never seen it. I've used syndication-source when I don't know the URL or where a CMS/API doesn't allow me to get the URL, as you can point syndication-source back to the root domain URL.

I've also seen sites just post something like "Originally published on http://example.com/page" without incurring any penalties.

To do it by the book, I'd suggest canonical first, syndication-source second, and a source link third. And in this case I'd suggest doing it by the book because syndicated content is generally not going to give you a lot of organic search benefit. Hopefully that helps.

Penalties from third-party spam are rare, but it happens. Just to make sure we're on the right path, I'd first take some top pages and fetch/render them. Submit 4-5 of the top pages to the index. If everything looks fine in the render and submitting them to the index works, we eliminate 99% of technical issues.

If you're seeing spam links coming in you should definitely start with the disavow. Do you have a manual penalty notice in Webmaster tools? If so, I'd submit a reconsideration request explaining that your client is not doing this link building AFTER the disavow is in.

Beyond keeping the disavow updated and trying to get Google to care about your reconsideration request, there's not a lot you can do. In one case I was able to get an IP address from a legitimate site that had spam comments and trace that back to a competitor's office. In most cases you just have to try keeping up with the garbage.

If it's just an indexation issue you can try the "fetch as google" feature under the crawl menu. You can google the site:URL to see whether this is necessary.

Your PA might have dropped on the home page if you changed the URL. For pages that Moz hasn't been able to look at and compute the default score is 1. All new pages are always 1, and will update when the new index comes out (roughly every 1-2 months). Also make sure you do a 301 redirect if you've changed the URLs.

Sometimes it requires a little more time and effort depending on which keywords you're targeting. Without seeing the site and looking at the links I can't say much more about it, but the first thing I'd look at is your backlink profile. If it looks like a lot of links anyone can get by posting a comment or something, there may be the problem.

Just to add on to what Kevin is saying, a reconsideration request is generally not the way to go unless you've received a manual warning in Search Traffic > Manual Warnings. It's more likely that the site doesn't rank due to limited backlinks and content. Make sure you look at the keywords you want to rank for and ask yourself whether you're providing as much value to the users as those on page 1.

TL;DR: You're right to be skeptical that this is an urgent issue (in my opinion), but it is something worth fixing at some point for several reasons.

I was far more concerned by search results, but I see you've added those to noindex/disallow in robots.txt, which is great. Not many people know that works!

I think it's very possible that Google understands the difference between a classified ad and an editorial content piece. They definitely treat products and content differently. That said, it's generally a good idea to avoid relying on Google's intelligence, as many have been let down by Google's failure to understand.

Duplicate content is generally something SEOs are overly-concerned with. More often than not it triggers a filter - not a "penalty." I don't see it as the most dangerous thing you could be doing by any stretch of the imagination. That said, I've seen several classified sites do the following, which I'd recommend as a "best practice" approach. At one time Craigslist did this, and may still be doing it.

• Accept non-spam ads with a pending status
• Check against listings in a given period of time for duplicates. This happens even if the ad is changed slightly, so there's some kind of semantic+image analysis going on.
• If a duplicate is found under the same user name, inform them that they've already posted the ad. From here the rules are up to you. Many sites say the ad can't be posted again for 7 days (if the old ad is deleted) or 30 days (if not). They then encourage users to buy a featured listing that shows up higher than others.
• If duplicates are found under different user names, give a warning that it's against your terms of service (make sure it is) to post duplicate ads from multiple accounts, that accounts can be banned, and have them certify the post is not the same.

You don't need to follow this exactly, but it's here to give you some ideas on having your users prevent duplicate content for you. Given the general positive architecture I've seen on the site it looks like you know what to do with the site better than I would.

Now I don't think 250 out of 10k is bad. Having consulted with a few local classified sites that's actually quite low. But I do think there's something to be gained by detecting duplicates to prevent users from gaining an unfair advantage over those playing by the rules. And if you sell featured listings this is an excellent way to help those who are most desparate to sell while increasing revenue.

I hope that helps.

Obligatory disclaimer: This is merely free advice for your consideration, and not the Moz official stance. The consequences of any changes you do or don't make are ultimately your responsibility.

I'm trying to understand WHY they're using hidden H1s at all? I see no good reason to put H1s in a hidden class if it's not displayed on the page. Is there some sort of functionality mapped to the H1s? If so, it should be done some other way if you don't actually want it to show. I don't have the full context, but it really sounds like a bad attempt to get keywords on the page. It won't work, and it could do some harm.

Looking into the code it seems like there's an excessive amount of markup. Each schema type has various rules about what it should apply to, so it's not hard to violate one of the rules if you're not consciously applying each rule. Just a quick look and I see 13 of these:

itemscope="itemscope"

Not sure what that's supposed to be doing, but I don't think it's correct syntax. Unfortunately looking deeply into a page with so much markup (101 itemprops!) to fix every possible violation is WAY beyond the scope of a question that I can answer here. Generally I'd suggest only using markup where you really want the snippet to appear rather than tagging everything. There's just too much to go wrong.

Beyond that, use Google's structured data testing tool and the structured data section in Webmaster Tools to make sure what you have is working. There are probably some Magento plugins that could handle this for you. Really I think all you need to tag are the product and review-centered markup.

Sorry that didn't help as much as you'd like, but there are dozens of potential minor technical problems to fix. There's enough markup that I can see why Google thinks its spam. In this case, less is probably more. I'd consolidate way down to review markup, make sure it's accurate, and only expand markup carefully once that's working.

Honestly, Google is pretty smart about these spam links. They see hacked sites all the time, and chances are good that those spam links are not related to the content you're actually building the site around. That means the real risk is likely very low. That's especially true if the spam pages on your site created by the hacking are now 404ing. It's clear you're not trying to manipulate rankings.

You can feel free to add spam links to the disavow pre-emptively.

https://searchenginewatch.com/sew/news/2309486/matt-cutts-use-the-link-disavow-tool-even-if-your-site-hasnt-been-penalized

Just make sure you only blacklist a site if the entire site is pure spam. Otherwise use the page disavow feature. I'd say you may as well do this, but it wouldn't be my top priority. The exception to this is if you were hacked and the spam links are relevant.

Example: If the hacker created doorway pages about viagra, and your site is about sports memorabilia, I'd not be too concerned. Just make sure all the pages about viagra are dead. You can still submit a disavow. I probably would just to be on the safe side, but only once I got around to it.

If the hacker created doorway pages about sports jerseys, and your site is about sports memorabilia, I'd be concerned. This could look like an attempt to manipulate Google's rankings, so I'd step on the disavow. And again, make sure any pages created by the spammers are 404ing or 410ing (even better).

Generally I'd not worry too much about duplicate warnings like this, especially if the duplicate pages are being created by parameters. Though Moz won't be able to see it, check Google's search console (AKA webmaster tools) under parameters to see how many portfolio IDs are being crawled. You can even set the parameter manually, though I find "Let Googlebot decide" usually works just fine.

The canonical tag is a good idea. Definitely use a canonical tag that to point back to the original version of the page. Without seeing the site I can't give you more specific info than that.

I'd probably not use robots.txt, just because I'd worry your content would be harder to crawl once a session is tagged with profile ID. It all depends on where users/bots pick up the profile ID variable from.

Very hard to respond to this, but I'll do my best. First, there's no real point in starting a new site if it's going to be thin content all over again. If you just post videos from other sites with some text, you're just a re-aggregator of content. I'd think about what you can do to make your site actually more useful. Think about things like this:

• Are there search,filter, rating, or navigational features your competitors are using that your site lacks?
• Are your titles accurate and specific, or vague and targeted towards similar terms? You want to be accurate and specific. You don't want to mislead anyone with promised value only to disappoint them.
• How can you add useful content at scale?

I'd generally lean towards using the existing site, but it can take a while for Google to reconsider it. It's your call, but the important thing is to make sure your pages aren't thin and you're delivering value.

Hi there,

A lot of people have been receiving these warnings for blog network use and other low-quality/paid links. I wrote about it on the blog recently. My advice is to do your best to remove the links that are clearly low-quality - Google is telling you directly to clean things up, and may hit you with a penalty if things don't get better.

Link networks have been slammed time and time again. Here's one I wrote specifically about one of the larger private blog networks:

http://www.seomoz.org/blog/unnatural-link-warnings-blog-networks-advice

The problem with these sites is the either don't have any link equity - and thus their links count for nothing - or they get link equity from spammy sites. It only takes one site to get the entire web of sites caught. Google might move slowly on link spam, but they have shown they take strong and unforgiving action, as witnessed by Penguin and similar updates.

Just think about the opportunity cost of using these link networks rather than pursuing a legitimate means of promotion. If you get caught, all your work is gone. Worse, you're in a far worse position than when you started.

I have personally been approached by large brands using link networks who were then penalized. One online company people know came to us having invested heavily into link networks. They lost all that work, they were losing hundreds of thousands each week in sales due to penalty, and it cost them tens of thousands to fix.

I would only try link networks for brand new sites in certain highly-competitive industries  - casinos, adult, etc. For anyone else, it's not worth the risk and opportunity cost.

Firstly, I'd wonder about how these "toxic" links were built in the first place. If you were running around generating articles for links and participating in link schemes you may very well have links that are holding you back. One can typically tell by looking at the anchor text pointing to your site; if it's full of unnatural anchor text like "best SEO firm" rather than "[site/brand name]", they could very well hurt you now or in the future.

Don't trust the links to be high quality just because they use the phrase. All the spam emails I get from low-quality spam link builders use words like "natural," "organic," and "high quality." I'm also skeptical that they're talking about "getting links" without content or some broader marketing strategy. How are they going to do it? What are they going to share?

Honestly I've seen people do more harm than good buying into link-building contracts. Quantity may or may not matter more than quality - it depends on the proportion of each - but legitimacy matters more than either. Do you expect these links to generate awareness for your brand and drive people to your site? Why not do both, and do actual marketing in the process of building links? It's smart business, and tends to focus on activities Google won't penalize a few years from now.

I don't know the company or the situation, but do be careful and keep a long-term vision in mind.

Firstly, I wouldn't worry about your customers creating "low-quality links" unless your customers are exclusively spammers. Low authority links and spam links are two very different things in Google's eyes.

If the links point to pages that a user could not see without logging in, simply use a meta robots noindex to ensure the pages won't appear in search results. This isn't especially critical, since the page would be unlikely to appear in results anyway, but you can follow the best practice of blocking content behind a wall if you're worried about it.

If you do have a lot of customers running sites Google might consider spammy, let me know and we'll talk about it from there. Otherwise you don't need to worry.

Hi Marisa,

To determine which pages should be noindexed, first ask yourself first whether a user would want to land on the URL in question. Second, is the URL receiving traffic as an organic landing page right now? Third, does the content serve a purpose to the user? Does it need to exist?

If the answer to all of the above questions is "no," then go ahead and noindex the page. If you answer yes to one of the above, some evaluation is in order. Can you add content, improve the navigation and appearance, or make the page more useful rather than noindexing it?

Generally you can enhance gallery pages for search engines and users by labeling/captioning the images and making sure the alt text is in order. On category pages, add some content, label products, and provide them with a next action.

Do the popups contain useful, non-repeating, or important info? If so, can the content be placed on the page somewhere instead? The only way I would use a popup and noindex it is if the content in the popup is optional and duplicated, such as the often-seen "What's This?" that explains a field or term that is repeated across the site, and each instance makes a new URL.

I've never heard of anyone running into problems with Google for noindexing too much stuff. You're essentially just telling them that the page is not good for users to find. You will, however, tend to improve organic traffic and user experience by making each page useful and adding an appropriate amount of content.

Hope that helps,

Carson

Dr. Pete has covered this well. My advice is first not to buy links.

If you do insist on buying links or hiring a "guaranteed link-building" firm, however, I'd make sure to know their methods. Can they offer you a current client to look at? Will you be shown the links when they go live? If not, you'll probably find your "50 links" on terrible, irrelevant sites and on big lists of links.

Hi Ewan,

This is a question that probably deserves a blog post at some point, along with a number of related questions about link-based penalties. I've been gathering info for some time, and have seem many instances of redirecting sites that have been penalized. I wish I could collect data on penalized sites more scientifically, but we work with what's available.

Manual Penalties

Manual penalties appear to carry through to new domains almost instantly when redirected to pages housing the same content. Google appears to use a number of signals to make sure that the redirect is to the same site and not to a competitor.

Some Googlers have claimed that if you received an "unnatural link" warning in WMT, it's manual. I'm not entirely convinced of this, but it's now harder than ever to differentiate between manual link-based penalties and Penguin algorithmic adjustment. That brings us to...

Refreshing Adjustments (Penalties)

Panda, Penguin, and a few other updates are a little different. We've seen instances where a user makes a big change (a complete redesign for Panda, or redirecting the entire site); the trend seems to be a brief recovery followed by a drop once the algorithm refreshes.

The obvious up-side here is that if you were going to recover from the penalty anyway, you may start to recover a bit sooner and don't have to wait for the next refresh. The downside is that it's a lot of work to do correctly, and it might be a very short-lived change.

--

Generally, I'd say it's best to clean up the site and keep going on the same domain. If you have a lot of bad links pointing to a specific page, you may want to 410 that page and start a new one, then mention this in your reconsideration request. Otherwise, it's the old process of removal (keeping notes) and using disavow if reconsideration and clean up prove insufficient.

Hi there,

You can use press releases to get more coverage and awareness. Simply posting releases for the sake of link equity is a very outdated tactic that will not work well. Google has said they don't want to "count" links from press release aggregation, and most of the links are nofollowed anyway. Additionally, if you use too much targeted anchor text, you might run into problems with Penguin penalties.

http://searchengineland.com/google-links-in-a-press-release-should-be-nofollowed-like-advertisements-168339

My advice is to experiment with well-written press releases only when you have something that is actually newsworthy and that people will actually care about. Don't just submit them and wait - there's a lot more to it. There's an entire marketing sub-field (public relations) devoted to getting positive media coverage from which you can draw.

Do you have WMT on the redirecting site? It would be nice to know if the redirecting site may have already received a warning.

My best advice to you is that this is both an SEO decision and a business decision. I would hate to see you, as the new SEO, be held responsible to make the decision and take the heat for all of this. It sounds like you have a firm grasp of the alternative courses of action, the pros and cons of each, and the risks involved. Present the situation to the business owners or managers, the risk of keeping them (penalties) and the risk of cutting them (drops).

It sounds like a legitimate link-building campaign is part of any strategy going forward, so stopping the spammy stuff and doing good stuff in the future might be enough. Again, though, I'd suggest letting people in leadership positions at least weigh in on it.

Hi there,

I'm sorry that your site isn't doing as well as you'd like. Hopefully we can get to the bottom of this!

First, I've dealt with a LOT of link penalty questions, and I don't think that's what's happening. Consider, for example, that you have a ton of links for your Frugal 100 program. If you were slapped by Penguin, you would almost definitely not be ranking for "Frugal 100."

If your traffic is down - and SearchMetrics doesn't see it that way - please remember that it could just be fluctuation and SERP volatility that newer sites are prone to. Google tests, gives, takes away, and then gives back.

If you've been penalized (and I'm kinda doubting it), it's probably because of Panda. You have a LOT of really thin pages with little or no content on them and a heavy template. Can you add more content per page or scale back on the template space for individual deals? Do each of these deals need their very own page? I'm not sure, but a lot of deal sites don't do that.

I also noted that you have some adult deals on your site. Do keep in mind that Google might choose not to show the site for SFW deal-related terms if it thinks your content has a lot of NSFW stuff on it.

I hope this helps. Your site doesn't feel like most sites that get penalized - it seems useful to the people it serves. I think you'll be just fine in the end