So you are ready to disavow all those bad links…
Are you sure you want to do that?
Google’s Disavow Links Tool can be very helpful in getting rid of links to your site which may be hurting your rankings. But it is also very possible to do some serious damage to your own website’s rankings with it if you disavow the wrong backlinks. Before you start taking a machete to your link profile, be absolutely certain that:
- You do indeed have a manual penalty like an Unnatural Links warning, algorithmic filter (Penguin), or an attempted negative SEO attack on your site.
A slight ranking drop is not a reason to use the disavow tool. - You know how to identify which links are causing the problem. Misidentifying and disavowing the wrong links can make things much worse.
- You are SURE you know how to identify bad or good links. Really, make sure. Just because you don’t remember seeing that link before doesn’t mean it is a bad link. And just because a link comes from a “good” site, does not mean it can’t be considered a spam link.
Be extremely careful when choosing which links to keep or disavow – you may not be able to “undisavow” mistakes! Tests have been done where known-good links were disavowed, and then later they were taken out of the disavow list. The positive impact those links once had did not return. Be careful!
More About When Not to Use the Google Disavow Tool
“The whole concept of disavowing unnatural links must be taken very seriously as it may also harm your ranking. This process should not be done on a haste.”
