On MetaFilter Being Penalized By Google: An Explainer

MetaFilter is a news and discussion site dating back to the early years of the web. Founded in 1999, it’s attracting attention this week after coming forward about how a Google penalty has severely harmed its business, to the degree of having to let staff go. It serves as a poster child of…

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Were You Really Hit By A Search Engine Penalty, Or Is It Something Else?

Often, I’ll speak to prospective clients who think they’ve been hit by an algorithm update or a penalty. They’ve lost a lot of organic traffic, so they immediately think that a search engine change is to blame. Unfortunately, I’ve also run into many situations where SEOs are…

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How A Single Guest Post May Have Gotten An Entire Site Penalized By Google

Google made it clear earlier this year that those doing guest posts “for SEO purposes” might be subject to penalties. But the latest chapter in its war on guest posts feels a bit crazy: an entire site put into Google’s penalty box because of a single guest post that Google…

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Penalized & Sad: When To Abandon The Sinking Ship

Sometimes the captain can’t afford to go down with the ship, no matter the temptation or emotional investment. Every few weeks, I receive another hopeless phone call from another desperate webmaster. Since Penguin, I’ve seen more ships go down than I care to count. Websites that have delved…

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“Text Link Ads” Was Latest Hit By Google’s Actions Against Link Sellers

On May 15th we reported that Google targeted yet another link selling network that resulted in several thousand penalties. Google’s head of search spam, Matt Cutts, has revealed which link network was the target via Twitter last week. The target was one of the oldest and arguably the most…

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The importance of a link clean up before it’s too late

headerUsing LinkRisk and LinkDetox, Agnete Tøien Pedersen takes a look at the importance of a link clean up before it’s too late.

Post from on State of Search
The importance of a link clean up before it’s too late

Google Hits Mozilla With Spam Penalty Over User Generated Content

Have user generated content on your site? Pay attention to what those users are doing. That’s the takeaway from Google hitting Mozilla with a spam penalty this week, along with another takeaway. Despite Google’s saying it’s being more transparent about spam actions, people clearly…

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