Negative SEO: myth or reality?

Negative SEO has been a topic of concern and debate in the digital marketing world for many years. This practice seeks to sabotage a competitor by creating low-quality links to their website, generating fear among site owners and SEO professionals. Recently, however, Gary Illyes of Google has provided valuable information that clarifies why negative SEO does not work as many fear.

What is Negative SEO?

Negative SEO is a malicious strategy in which low-quality spammy links are generated pointing to a website with the intention of getting Google to penalize it. The idea is to make Google believe that the targeted site is trying to manipulate its rankings, which could result in a decrease in its visibility in search results.

Origins of Negative SEO

The practice of negative SEO has its roots in the online gambling industry, where competition is extremely high and the benefits of ranking high are significant. It was around the mid-2000s that negative SEO began to be talked about, especially with the growing importance of a website’s link profile.

Google’s response to negative SEO

In a recent interview, Gary Illyes, Webmaster Trends Analyst at Google, addressed the issue of negative SEO. Illyes explained that Google has implemented several measures to prevent low-quality links from negatively affecting legitimate websites.

Illyes mentioned that during the launch of the Penguin update, which focused on combating link spam, he received hundreds of examples of alleged instances of negative SEO. However, after a thorough review, he discovered that virtually none of these cases were actually negative SEO. According to Illyes, the fear of negative SEO is disproportionate to its reality.

Why negative SEO links don’t work

Gary Illyes explained that Google evaluates the context of inbound links. If a site with irrelevant subject matter links to another site, Google simply doesn’t count those links. For example, if a site that sells over-the-counter pharmaceuticals links to a flower page, Google will not consider that link relevant or valid for PageRank calculation.

This means that Google is able to discern when a link comes from an irrelevant or suspicious source and consequently disables those links so that they do not affect the target website.

The relevance of links in SEO

Years ago, it was possible to improve a website’s ranking by mass link building from any source, regardless of its relevance. However, over time, Google has improved its algorithms to focus on the quality and relevance of links. Today, links that do not thematically match the content of the target website are ignored, which eliminates the effectiveness of negative SEO.

Funny facts about links and ranking in Google

A recent study by Internet Marketing Ninjas found that more than 96% of sites ranking in the top 10 positions in Google have more than 1,000 links from unique domains. Only 0.3% of sites in the top 10 positions have less than 100 links. This shows that, although Google claims that links are not one of the top three ranking factors, sites with good rankings tend to have more links. However, it is also true that pages that rank well attract more links because of their visibility.

Conclusion

The fear of negative SEO has been a constant concern for many in the digital marketing industry. However, recent statements by Gary Illyes of Google assure us that the company has implemented effective safeguards to protect websites from these malicious practices. In the end, the key to good search engine rankings remains the creation of quality content and obtaining relevant and legitimate links. Also, if you want to improve your SEO strategy, we recommend checking out the 5 best SEO plugins for WordPress, which can help you optimize your site more effectively.

In short, negative SEO is more of a myth than an effective reality. Instead of worrying about possible negative SEO attacks, website owners and SEO professionals should focus on positive and constructive strategies that will actually benefit their online presence.