Whether or not to remove a link from a website with high spam score on Open Site Explorer
-
Hello Moz!
I just subscribed for your Moz Pro program. Amazing stuff!
On open site explorer, I found a number of links to my site from a page called with a very high page authority and high domain authority, but also a high spam score (8 or 9, one with a 10).
I say multiple spam scores, because it's strange, there are what appears variations of the same url, and each one is considered a link. For instance, there's an abc.linkstomysite.com and xyz.linktomysite.com, and 123.linktomysite.com... there are about 15 of these (all with the spam scores mentioned above)!
This must have been some old SEO work done I payed for back in the prehistoric SEO days. However, my fear is the following: Removing these links, and then losing some potentially strong link juice. I don't have many high DA or PA links to my site, and these are some major ones.
The domain in question "linktomysite.com", when entered into OSE, only has a spam score of 4, and it has a domain authority of 45 and page authority of 37. My site has a spam score of 2 and no messages from google regarding a penalty, but an overall reduction in google traffic over the years (just keeps slowly dropping... as if a weight is pulling me down?)
What do you think, should I leave, or remove? The linkstomysite page is just a LONG page full of links, with short descriptions, nothing of value, but with a an old domain age (relatively).
Most important for me is keeping at least some ranking/visibility, while I personally work on building quality links and helpful content.
thanks!
-
Huh! Fair enough.
-
I was searching on freedownloadhub linkexchange and happened across this thread. It look like the site has taken down all of the link exchange pages. They still return a 200 (found) response code, but have the following text:
Link Exchange Update
Due to changes in Google's ranking rules this service has become outdated. Due to a number of requests to de-list URLs, we have decided to end this service.
-
Anything with "Link Exchange" in the title should be bumped to a Spam Score 100
Those are really, really horrible links. I'd probably disavow them just to be safe. On the other hand, unless you've received a manual action notice in Google Webmaster Tools, it's quite possible those links aren't hurting you at all and Google is simply ignoring them.
On the other hand, those links are just awful.
-
...wow. Yeah, you're not kidding. Everything from the domain to "/Link-Exchange" looks so spammy as to be almost comical. If someone showed me that site, I'd tell them it's spam without hesitating.
I'm starting to lean toward killing those links, definitely. It's a tough call, though. Or at least a strange one.
-
Thanks, Matt. The strange thing is that when you plug the site into OSE, it has the spam score of 4, but on my link analysis, the scores are 8, 9, and 10.
Not to mention there are a bunch of subdomains of same page, take a look below please.. everything screams spam, but the DA and PA is what's keeping me from disavowing or removing (probably need to learn these individual terms, DA and PA, a little better). Plus my own spam score is only 2... so maybe not harming me?
http://www.xdsddwfdwwffdwd.freedownloadhub.com/Link-Exchange/browse.php?id=6
http://www.xdsddsfcwfwdwasffdwd.freedownloadhub.com/Link-Exchange/browse.php?id=6
http://www.dsessssderfeg.freedownloadhub.com/Link-Exchange/browse.php?id=6
and 10 more just like it.
Looks so crappy to me, but like you said, with a 45 DA, I'm really thinking about it. Not to mention, I really need to work on getting some quality links, but it's hard in my niche (men's sexual health)... so removing something with good rank to it, worries me.
-
Hi David!
You're getting great advice from Andy and Patrick, but I wanted to add that a site with a spam score of 4 and a DA of 45 is really unlikely to cause you a problem. Rand's initial post on spam score may clarify a bit, but we don't generally flag a link as potentially harmful until it has a score of 5.
I can't guarantee that site is _not _causing harm, but a 45 DA is reasonably solid. Really consider whether you want to risk losing any potential benefits from that link before you get rid of it.
-
Absolutely - would be worth adding Anchor Text into the mix as well.
-Andy
-
Hi there
Very true - but nofollow's do provide value and can potentially be great links.
I will add this though - thanks so much!
-
You missed a biggy Patrick - is it dofollow / nofollow
-Andy
-
Hi there
Based on what you're saying here, I would remove this link and disavow it.
The best way to assess backlinks are to ask the following questions:
-
Does this link help my website?
-
Does it send quality traffic?
-
Is this link relevant to my website?
-
Would I trust this site (that's linking to me) if I landed on it?
-
Is the website or content in which I am being linked from topically relevant to my website?
-
If you check metrics - does anything about the metrics (domain authority, page authority,Majestic, SEMRush traffic/ranking data, etc) make me feel uneasy?
-
Are the links from directory templates? (example)
-
Inspect URLs with blatant spam words
-
Free
-
Porn
-
XXX
-
Submit
-
Directory
-
Paid
-
Links
-
URL
-
Sex
-
etc.
-
Check for multiple domains and URLs on the same IPs
-
This can usually show link farms or spam
-
Don't be quick to discount nofollow links - nofollow's do provide value, so as long as they pass your sniff test, don't remove them simply because of this tag
These links don't provide any value, and the higher the spam score the more reason you have to remove it. Although, you should get second opinions from tools like Majestic, Ahrefs, and Search Console as well.
Hope this helps - good luck!
-
-
Hi David,
Spam scores like this are based on algorithms, so without seeing the links, it would be very difficult to advise correctly on this. There are other factors to take into account as well.
Would you like to PM me the information and I would be happy to take a look for you.
-Andy
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
-
Losing links
my blog/website is at ocpatentlawyer.com. My reports are showing that I'm losing links. Is there a way to find out which links I've been losing to see if it is something that I should be concerned about?
Moz Pro | | jamesjd710 -
Open Site Explorer backlink results different that MajesticSEO... why?
When checking the number of external links linking to a site, Open Site Explorer and MajesticSEO give completely different results. In one case Open Site Explorer is saying the website has: "49 Total Links" and MajesticSEO is saying the website has: "6,143 External Backlinks (in the last 5 years)" and "497 External Backlinks (in the last 90 days)" Does anyone know why this is?
Moz Pro | | conor10050 -
Is my Site Spam?
Recently google dropped our site a big time. Can some body tell me if my site is spammy. Our visibility was 67% and one of our top competitor had the visibility of 72%. www.aa-rental.com
Moz Pro | | tanveer10 -
Can you explain social indicators in Open Site Explorer
My Google +'s for my domain were 403 last month and 35 this month.... Based on this I'm assuming OSE's numbers are not cumulative. Are they based on the previous month or a different time period? Any explanations would be helpful. Thanks!
Moz Pro | | theLotter0 -
Site Optimisation for ktichens!!
Hey Guys, I am about to begin to optimise this site www.stuartandersonkitchens.co.uk for some keywords such as edinburgh kitchens, quality kitchens edinburgh etc as he is based in edinburgh. I am also going to be doing some work behind the bones of the site optimisiing alt, meta data, micro data etc. Also I am thinking about creating a FB, Twitter, Youtube profile and possibly adding him to a few directories (DMOZ etc), some local & running a small adwords campaign using the freebie credits. I will be altering some of the content in order to have it more amicable to the engines. Is there any other advice anyone would like to give me, where I could improve in order to have him seen on the search engines. Be great to here your take on this. Thanks again, Craig
Moz Pro | | fenwaymedia0 -
Too Many On-Page Links
The SeoMoz site crawler says all my pages have too many links. I am using Dreamweaver with a horizontal Spry drop-down menu bar. My site has several hundred pages and about 100 of them show up in this Spry menu bar. I believe that this would be considered a false positive for too many links - am I right? Or is Google seeing this also as too many links per page? I am trying to get my Google rankings back after being hurt badly by the Penguin. I am using php but don't see another way to do the site links without going to a CMS type site. Thanks for any help you can give.
Moz Pro | | johnsearles0 -
How Is The Quality Of Backlinks Assessed In Open Site Explorere?
How do I asses the higest quality backlinks using the Open Site Explorer tool? Is there a measurement that ranks the highest quality backlinks for a given search? Thanks. Sunil.
Moz Pro | | sunilmuse0 -
Can't find email address or contact form on website I want link from
Hi, How do you use whois or other resources to find an email address for a site that doesn't list their email address or have a contact form? Our competitors look like they have contacted the site but I don't know how to contact the site myself. They have a facebook fan page and a twitter account. Thanks.
Moz Pro | | BobGW0