Disavow Tool What A Major Mistake
I believe disavow tool is one of the mistakes wannabe agencies make far too often!
The reason I went from offering SEO services for clients to starting my own businesses and ranking them for myself is because of clients like these, so thank you if I have ever done work for you and you felt I charged too much, argued about what should be done, or just plain out ignored common sense if it wasn't for you I wouldn't be where I am today!
So typically my posts are in reference to a particular client/clients I have had over the years and I know some of you may be shaking your heads saying one client doesn't prove one method or another works or doesn't. Before you get your "depends" in a bunch hear me out! This particular client had been doing business with me for over 4-5 years and didn't know it as I was that shadow, a ghost in the night, or otherwise known as the white label provider. We took this guy from nothing to #1 for almost every major personal injury lawyer keyword in major cities in Florida. He was upset that he was only ranking between 3-4 position for car accident keywords, which at the time Google had just recently done away with custom categories so after he complained within 24 hours he was ranking #1 for car accident related keywords, wow right!? Now call it black hat if you will but personally I don't believe it was, we simply used mapmaker to add the custom category car accident attorney etc... if it was Black Hat don't you think Google would had denied our edit? Anyhow let's fast forward after ranking for 4-5+ years in one of the toughest and most competitive areas he starts to have issues because he didn't really have employees at some of his virtual offices. So we help him resolve this issue and get his listings unsuspended which btw we discussed prior to them becoming suspended that it was a terrible idea the way he was operating and put his locations at risk.
No Loyalty To The SEO Agency Who Saves The Day
Just to clarify I am not mad, no hard feelings, or anything to that extent at the end of the day it's these types of things that really motivated me to open up shops of my own! But if you are an SEO agency or Freelancer you probably have experienced these types of clients that just make you want to pull your hair out! Not because the SEO is hard but you have to prove to them every little thing which takes longer than the work itself, even after you have proven that you know what you are talking about! We will call this client Lincoln so Lincoln has an SEO freelancer working on stuff while I am in charge of local (Google My Business). This Freelancer decides that we need to disavow every link unless it's top-notch, which btw they were disavowing links with over a million traffic, 10 million value, and a DR of 91+ simply because they believed .edu links are a big no, no. This isn't the issue with their rankings, the real problem was 2-3 of their locations was completely deleted, gone, vanished, goodbye, including all reviews were lost. We were able to get them reinstated but was basically starting over. To top it off they were using a custom theme that had become obsolete and section 1,2,3,4,5 were now being used in the order of 3,5,1,2 etc... meaning that it was almost impossible to update a page because each section wasn't really the section you thought it was.
Weekly Disavow
So this SEO freelancer is doing weekly disavow, I mean hundreds of links and ones that were even driving traffic. As I plead that this is stupid and every month they are tanking as a result from it, they continue to do it anyway! While the real problem this custom theme that is band aided together with 30+ plugins which is slowing the site down needs fixed as well as we started over with their new GMB listings that recently was re-instated. They continue to disavow links every week and soon the file becomes thousands! Meanwhile their organic rankings are tanking, yet they trust this guy because he has been part of the team for a very very long time. He may have even know what he was doing when it came to some stuff but this was way over his head.
Lets Use Common Sense When It Comes To Disavow Tool
So lets use some common sense when it comes to disavow tool, when should disavow tool be used? When you are hit with a penalty! If there is no penalty and your rankings are good YOU SHOULDNT USE DISAVOW TOOL! I will say it again, don't use disavow tool if you don't have a manual penalty! Once again they continue disavowing like it's taking out the garbage, no big deal, and the continue to slide farther and farther in to the dark abyss which is around page 5-6 at this time. Google chooses what links count and which ones don't! End of story... So if you haven't been flagged with a manual penalty there is no need for the disavow tool. This particular SEO freelancer had a theory that if you remove all the fluff and only have the best of the best links you will rank better. Sounds great right? Well nothing looks more unnatural than a website that only has the best of the best links! No website only gets the best of the best links! The real problem is there are a lot of so called SEO experts who claim this method ranks you better! In some instances it might, but nothing looks more unnatural than a website with only great links! Not to mention if the links you are disavowing are bad which most likely were being ignored, well now you are waving a big red flag, Hey Google! Over here! We built these crappy links, we are sorry!!! Please forgive us!!! Stupid, just stupid! If you have a website work 200k+ in traffic and you drop to the 40-50k range while a SEO agency or Freelancer is telling you it's dropping because of a problem it's time to start realizing that maybe the guy who re-instated your suspended listings, ranked keywords you were struggling with in 24 hours, and also ranked you for over 4-5 years might know a little more than the guy tanking your website! End of rant, but I must say thank you! For making me realize I should rank my own stuff because I see the value in ranking #1 and not worrying about an .edu link from years prior that Google hasn't flagged me for and I don't have a manual penalty or any other issue. I also make sure my website is up to date and don't try to band aid a custom theme with 30+ plugins. Stop disavowing links if you don't have a manual penalty or you to could be left on page 5-6 or beyond!
Use common sense when it comes to SEO, generally 9 times out of 10 it's that simple when it comes to SEO but people over think, over complicate, and ultimately destroy an empire with a tool that warns you several times before submitting!