This SOP is a work in progress. If you notice anything that is out of date, could be more clear or could be more efficient please update the SOP or add a comment to start a conversation.
Purpose
Spam backlinks are links to your site from bad, irrelevant websites. Too many of these will cause Google to take action against your site. From time to time, we may need to clean up backlink profiles to maintain authority with Google.
Procedure
Inputs:
You have a considerable number of spammy, artificial, or low-quality links pointing to your site
The links have caused a manual action, or likely will cause a manual action, on your site.
Log in
Enter the name of the website into the search bar
You may need to search BOTH the HTTP and HTTPS to get the full backlink profile
If this is the first time this is being done for a client, select “Historic Index”
If this is part of their regular cycle (every three months) select “Fresh Index”
Search
Your results page should look like this ^
Select Backlinks
1 backlink per domain
Show deleted backlinks
Click Export Data
Export the Data to a Google Sheet
Paste your data
Do not edit the formatting of this sheet
Click on the little arrow by the title of the column and sort column C Z-A
Then sort column B Z-A
Your sheet should look like this ^
Look at column B and delete any rows with a 10 or higher
Now check the website for each remaining link. If it seems related to the dealership or the vertical (Powersports, RV, Boats, Agriculture), remove the row from the list.
There is no way to reverse a disavow. Be extra careful when leaving domains on this list as removing a valuable, relevant domain can hurt the client
If you’re unsure, compile a list of domains you’re unsure about highlight the domain so the Rep knows to double check those specifically before we submit the final disavow file
Paste Column A rows 1-3 into the top of the sheet
Copy the list of domains in column C and paste it below the top three rows
When new domains are added after the first backlink scan, add them below the current disavowed list. We want to submit the full list each time we add more domains.
Your final sheet should look like this ^
Select the dealer website
If a site has moved to HTTPS, you may need to log into the SEM google account to find the most current search console entry
Click Disavow Links
Upload your .txt file
Submit
Note: Please clean up the Backlink Scan document each time you finish with it. You can click into each tab and CTRL+Z until the document is how you found it.
Outputs:
Removal of backlinks that could be hurting your rankings
This makes backlinks from authoritative sites stand out even more
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