Today Google sent out a mass broadcast to website owners warning them of the consequences of repeatedly breaking the Google Webmaster Guidelines.
The message was posted on the Webmaster Central Blog and emailed out to registered Google Search Console users.
“In order to protect the quality of our search results, we take automated and manual actions against sites that violate our Webmaster Guidelines. When your site has a manual action taken, you can confirm in the [Manual Actions] page in Search Console which part of your site the action was taken and why. After fixing the site, you can send a reconsideration request to Google. Many webmasters are getting their manual action revoked by going through the process.”
“However, some sites violate the Webmaster Guidelines repeatedly after successfully going through the reconsideration process….”
“…Such repeated violations may make a successful reconsideration process more difficult to achieve”.
- Google, 18/09/15
It is a stark reminder that the Search Quality Team is constantly working behind the scenes to uproot out spam and unethical SEO tactics to keep search results clean.
Website owners should be ever vigilant about their current SEO footprint and how it is perceived by the search engines. Most fall in to one of three categories:
- Those who are 100% Google compliant (White hat)
- Those who do ethical work but won't necessarily “bow down” to Google as gospel
- Those that are quite prepared to use whatever SEO tactics that will help them gain more visibility in the search results (Black hat)
It is of course up to you which route you choose to go down but you should definitely be aware which route your SEO agency is leading you down. To help, here are some questions to ask them…
- Do you comply with the Google Webmaster Guidelines?
- Which is more important – User Experience or Search Engines?
- Do you use automated link building methods?
- Do you produce shareworthy content?
- Do you participate in link schemes or paid links?
- Can you provide full transparency of your tactics used on our website?
- How do you measure success (Hint – the answer isn’t rankings)
- Can you show me examples of previous work?
- Have you ever caused a website to be penalised by Google?
Here at GWS Media, we fully understand the Google Webmaster Guidelines and have never had a website penalised.
If you would like us to audit your website for Google compliance, then we would love to hear from you - 0117 972 4835.
