How fast to change keyword rich anchor text
-
Hello,
A client of mine has a site with almost all keyword rich anchor text, The problem is on on a bunch of little blogs and some (mostly sitewide) paid links.
We are working to move into 100% white hat SEO, but we're doing it slowly.
My question is, how fast can we change the anchor text on all of these links? I'm worried that if I do it too fast that it will be a red flag.
Thanks.
-
I'd say the blogs probably aren't doing anything for you algorithmically and I'm guessing they're not what was sending you the non-repeat traffic. If you're paying for sitewides that are not nofollowed, you should think seriously about stopping that. Pay for links on other sites as much as you like but make sure they're nofollowed.
-
I see, I'll be more specific.
The client put up 40 blogs with no backlinks to the blogs and keyword rich anchor text.
The client paid a monthly fee to 8 or so websites for sitewide image ads.
We took off half the blogs and half of the sitewides and non-repeat traffic dropped by about 70%.
Now I am very shy about nofollowing or deleting anything, and I just want to know conservatively how fast do I change the remaining blog/paid link anchor text?
I'm link building with good content and eventually all this stuff will go away.
Thanks for getting back to me, Chris.
-
I don't think of the kind of links you mentioned in your question as "paid links". I think of paid links (of the variety Takeshi describes) as those that you pay for on a monthly basis and I think Takeshi is correct in that if the publisher isn't blatant they can be hard to detect--but not always. Those are the easiest kind to get rid of--you just stop paying for them. The kind of links you mentioned I think of as just run of the mill spam links--either they were free or they had a one time fee or someone was paid to add them to a network of some kind.
-
Hi Chris,
Could you look at something. Takeshi Young, who has gave me some really good advice, told me a couple of days ago:
"In regards to paid links, Google has a very hard time detecting these unless you are being blatant about them, and you will typically receive a notice in GWT if you receive a penalty for it. Check to see if there are any manual penalties on your site in GWT. If not, chances are Google has not discovered that the links are paid (yet).
Just trying to settle the confusion. I need to be very careful, as we took off a bunch of links before and rankings tanked.
I need to go the conservative route, but I don't know what that is. You've always gave good advice Chris, thanks for being in on this one.
-
If they're all followed links with exact match anchor text and you're thinking about making changes to them, I'd just start nofollowing the vast majority of them--maybe even all of them. Google already knows they're their and already knows they're spam and knows to discount them and now you want to go back and change them? I'd say no--as in nofollow. Then spend the client's money building higher quality links and citations.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Keyword Rich Domain
We purchased a keyword rich domain name to use with an existing website. What is the best way to use this domain? Below are some thoughts, I welcome any input. Use this domain as an add-on to the main domain, but only have it load one page off the main domain? Would that cause duplicate content issues? Create a single static page of content for the domain (separate from main domain) Redirect domain to page on master domain, would we loose any benefits of the keyword rich domain? Thank you!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | idlwebinc0 -
Keyword rank and redirecting
I'm creating a new amazon affiliate site. I've researched other successful sites. I've noticed that they are ranking for 1000s of keywords, but many of these long tail keywords are redirected back to a main page. I can see how this can reduce the overall total amount of content pages on the site. How are you able to rank for the keyword in the first place if the the page is redirected?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | lkomontt760 -
Why does our main keyword keep dropping?
Hey Guys, We've seen an alarming drop in our main keyword for our website. Our biggest driver of traffic has always been the search term 'gifts for men' which we commanded the top spot for a while, but have always been in the top 4 for. Recently (in the last 3-4 months) we dropped to 6 and as of last night we dropped down to 9th. We still rank number 2 for 'gift ideas for men'. Both search terms point to this page: GIfts For Men Nothing onsite or technically has changed, and there is consistently new content in the form of products being added almost daily. We hit a manual action back in October of last year and I'm concerned that the toxic links (that we didn't create mind you) we disavowed may have been unnaturally boosting this page and now we're dropping significantly because they're gone. Any ideas on how we can curb this concerning trend? Thanks a lot
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | TheGreatestGoat0 -
Changing the relevance of the homepage
One of my new clients is hell bent on changing the content of their homepage. They are one of the world's largest resort companies. The site is graphics-heavy (with embedded text), and barely contains any content. I haven't started any of the on-page optimization yet, but when I do, it will be a major overhaul. Despite the poor on-page of the site, they are getting great rankings and a ton of traffic due to number and quality of their backlinks and domain authority. My concern is this: they want to change the homepage and make it into a "vacation sweepstakes" type of page. Their logic seems to be that they will generate a lot of interest on the site and get people excited about winning an expensive dream vacation, which is all fine and dandy, however, my feeling is that this will change the relevance of the page. So, instead of pitching their ownership-based program, now, they will be promoting vacation contests. So here's the stupid question: would this have the potential to negatively affect their search engine results or the Domain Authority? I'm thinking of suggesting to them a less drastic approach. Perhaps something like the lightbox sweepstakes overlay on marshallsonline.com. At least, this way, we can keep the current homepage and improve on it, rather than going into another niche. Any feedback or suggestions on this is greatly appreciated!
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | ollan0 -
Is "Car Discount" a problematic anchor text for CarDiscount.com (google penguin)?
I have a couple of partial match domains in the format KEYOWRDdiscount.com and also the website name resembles domain name. "Car Discount" is not my website but just an example to illustrate:
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | lcourse
Is "Car Discount" a problematic anchor text for CarDiscount.com?
Should I try to modify existing external anchor texts to "CarDiscount" or "CarDiscount.com" instead of "Car Discount" Do you know of any cases where such anchor texts coinciding with partial match domain were likely reason for penguin penalization? Thanks.0 -
Can Google Read Text in Carousel
so what is the best practice for getting Google to be able to read text that populates via JQuery in a carousel. If the text is originally display none, is Google going to be able to crawl it? Are there any limits to what Google can crawl when it comes to JavaScript and text? Or is it always better just to hardcopy the text on the page source?
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | imageworks-2612900 -
Improving keyword stuffing and site menu
I'm doing some work on http://flyawaysimulation.com/ and would like some tips to avoid keyword stuffing for the term "flight simulator" on this page. Currently, there are about 42 occurrences of the term "flight simulator" on this page - which is above the SEOmoz 15 term recommended limit. However, looking at the page - they have used the term fairly and it doesn't appear that "inappropriate". Could you guys have a look and let me know your thoughts? What can be done? Where can the repetitions be removed from without hurting internal SEO? Also, from an SEO standpoint how could we improve the site menu? For example, if the word "downloads" were removed from the Downloads-->FSX Downloads, FS2004 Downloads, X-Plane Downloads menu (for example just FSX, FS2004, X-Plane) to remove repetition of the phrase - would engines understand that those are "Downloads" because of it being under the "Downloads" drop down list? Your thoughts, suggestions and ideas are greatly appreciated.
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | Peter2640 -
Image Search algo changes
Just seen the image algo changes that have apparently been put into place in the last 3 months My spam tester image site didnt seem to feel anything. Did anyone feel image search change (for better or worse?) And on what dates? Cheers Stephen
Intermediate & Advanced SEO | | firstconversion0