Google’s Mueller Calls Web 2.0 Style Links Spammy via @martinibuster

In a recent Webmaster Office Hours Hangout, Google’s John Mueller was asked about links from free posting sites. The technique of getting links from sites like Tumblr, classified sites, linking to your own profile in Alexa and other places that give links from profiles is called Web 2.0 Link Building.

Mueller didn’t specifically say the phrase Web 2.0 Link Building but the question and answers were specifically about the Web 2.0 link strategy.

Web 2.0 Link Building

Web 2.0 link building is a form of link building where you sign up at sites that are typically but not limited to social micro-blogging sites. After sign up you are granted a subdomain or a web space where you can blog and publish links to yourself.

This form of link building isn’t limited to blogs, it also includes obtaining links from author, user and website profiles on other sites.

Examples of sites that have been abused in Web 2.0 link building are:

• Tumblr
• Reddit
• Alexa
• Slideshare
• Medium
• Quora

An example of how in the past some have obtained a free link on someplace like Tumblr is to sign up, get a subdomain of Tumblr and then create blog posts with links back to the spammer’s website.

Spammers Say Web 2.0 Links Work

There are many low quality link builders who benefit from selling Web 2.0 links. Those spammers will predictably argue that Web 2.0 links still work and do it loudly.

But one has to understand that there is no spam technique on earth that lacks defenders in the form of spammers who profit from those techniques.

How Effective are Web 2.0 Links?

Those kinds of links are the easiest kind to spot and because of that they can be regarded as worthless.

The strategy itself is so simple to plan that a third grader with a juice box and ten minutes to spare could have created it.  Anyone who believes that a strategy so staggeringly simple can be difficult for Google to defeat is deluding themselves or their customers.

The best are editorially given links that someone chose to give because of the content. If editorially given links are the gold standard of links, then Web 2.0 links can be considered the pocket lint standard, they are that bad.

The person asking the question asked how effective those kinds of links are:

How effective is old off page SEO like backlinks creation? Many agencies spend lots of time doing old off page activities such as image sharing with links, article submission on sites like Tumblr, classified sites and other free posting sites where people hardly read any of the posts but those platforms for dropping links with some text basically majority of their site has poor quality posts.

Google Webmaster Trends Analyst John Mueller gave a straightforward and unambiguous answer:

So off hand, all of those examples that you mentioned are really terrible ways of promoting your website.

So that’s something where if you hire an agency and they go off and post links on Tumblr, on classified sites and free posting sites and they claim this is going to help your website then I would move to some other agency.

So just to be really clear like this kind of activity has zero value for SEO.

It’s not something where you’re promoting your website in any way but rather essentially they’re spamming the web.

So that’s something I would strongly discourage anyone from doing.

Quality Content and Outreach/Publicity for Links

Mueller then reaffirmed the strategy of building relevant content and telling others about it:

On the other hand, creating really fantastic content and then reaching out to perhaps other sites who want to talk about that content, that’s like a totally different story.

So it’s not the case that I would say any work that you do that results in getting a link is a bad thing. But rather you should be focusing on things where you end up getting natural links because of the value of your content that you’re providing and not focusing on dropping links into random places anywhere that you can drop a link randomly.

That kind of link building where a person has to think on a level that’s higher than a third grader (or a juice box) is what it takes to successfully rank relevant content. It’s a seemingly simple strategy but there is a world of nuance that goes into making that kind of link building successful.

Mueller then doubled down on criticizing Web 2.0 style spam:

That’s not going to help your website, that’s just going to considered as spam so that’s a really bad idea.

So that’s kind of link I can’t say in any amount of working on a website to improve the links that you would get is bad. But rather that you should definitely not be doing this kind of spam.

And if an agency is doing this kind of spam for you I would switch to a different agency.

High Quality Link Building Strategies

If you are interested in learning the nuances of link building strategies then you should take a look at a compilation of link building articles I wrote in 2019.

I share many tips from my own link building strategies developed over almost twenty years of search marketing.

A Year of Link Building Strategies
https://www.searchenginejournal.com/year-of-link-building-tips/341509/

 

https://www.businesscreatorplus.com/googles-mueller-calls-web-2-0-style-links-spammy-via-martinibuster/

Google’s Mueller Discusses Site Demotions via @martinibuster

A publisher with a long list of reasons why their site may have been demoted asked why the site was demoted in Google search results. John Mueller explained why the issues the publisher suspected weren’t necessarily the reason why the site was demoted.

Why is My Site Demoted?

The question that was asked noted several reasons why the site may have lost rankings, including competitor sabotage.

This is the question:

“My site is no longer appearing in search results. There are no violations on my site and it stopped appearing completely from March 12th. It’s a Google News approved site.

I received over 3,000 bad backlinks from my competitors and over fake DMCA complaints from my competitors which I have countered them and am awaiting Google’s response.

Why is my site de-indexed, demoted in Google when there is no violation on my site?”

Difference Between De-indexed and Demoted

Mueller began his answer by clarifying the difference between a demotion in rankings and being de-indexed. I’m not sure if “demoted” is a term used at Google. But it’s a descriptive word for communicating that a site lost rankings.

I think nowadays a site is either relevant or not relevant, rather than demoted or promoted.

Here is John’s explanation of the difference between de-indexed and demoted.

“It’s really hard to say without a site.

From our point of view there’s a really big difference between a site that’s de-indexed and a site that is demoted.

So de-indexed would be not appearing at all. It’s not indexed at all which oftentimes is either due to a very significant web spam issue or a technical issue.

And so… if it’s really de-indexed that’s something where oftentimes they’re really clear paths to resolving that.”

By a clear path Mueller probably is referencing the fact that Google notifies publishers via the Google Search Console if there’s an issue that results in being removed from Google’s index.

Mueller Explains Site Demotions

Now Mueller’s explains a site demotion:

“Whereas if it’s demoted where it’s not ranking as well as before then that’s a lot trickier because that can be due to a lot of different reasons, with regards to the quality of the content, kind of the general set up of the site, all of that can kind of play a role there.”

Negative SEO Links

Mueller downplays the effectiveness of bad backlinks pointed by competitors at the publisher’s website. Mueller doesn’t tell the publisher to file a link disavow, which is interesting because it affirms that Google has a handle on these kinds of links and doesn’t need a link disavow file because the links are not the reason for the site losing rankings.

One would think that if link disavows were important to solving these negative SEO problems Mueller would have recommended their use. But Mueller did not recommend link disavows for solving a negative backlink attack.

In fact, he said not to worry about those links because in his opinion Google very likely is ignoring them. So if Google is ignoring negative SEO links, then those cannot be the reason why a site lost rankings and filing a link disavow is trying to solve a problem with the wrong tool.

The solution for fixing a site demotion lies elsewhere.

Mueller on Links and DMCA:

“In general, I wouldn’t worry too much about these 3,000 bad backlinks from competitors. Our systems are pretty good at recognizing those kinds of things and ignoring them.

So that’s something I wouldn’t focus on too much.

With regards to DMCA complaints, obviously responding to them if they’re invalid is the right approach there…”

Takeaways

In order to understand what happened to a site, a publisher needs to understand what kinds of issues actually cause site demotions. The obvious reasons like bad links aren’t always the answer.

When a site is losing rankings and it’s difficult to find a reason why, it might be time to have someone with experience and an open mind to take a look at it.

There’s a related article that offers more insights from Google’s John Mueller:
Google Offers Reasons for Significant SERP Changes

 

https://www.businesscreatorplus.com/googles-mueller-discusses-site-demotions-via-martinibuster/