Since the Penguin algorithm changes, SEOs have been worried about a couple of things in particular. Firstly, they are concerned that all the illicit link-building tactics that their client’s previous SEOs engaged in (because, of course, they would never do such things themselves) are now going to have a negative consequence on a site’s ranking. The second major concern is that competitors can take advantage of Google’s scrutinizing of backlink profiles to deliberately create “bad links” and incur a penalty.
To allay some of those fears Google have released a tool that will allow webmasters to disavow those incoming links that might be causing their sites to be flagged by Google as engaging in bad link-building practices.
The Disavow Tool allows webmasters to upload a text file of domains and URLS that Google will then disregard, in much the same way that they disregard nofollow links. This is a somewhat out of character move for Google, who, as acolytes of the algorithm, prefer to rely on machine intelligence to winnow out the chaff. As usual, Google will take these link lists as a strong signal, rather than as an instruction that they are bound to follow. Continue reading