Your website’s strength is only as robust as the backlinks that you’ve got. This isn’t about numbers but rather quality. Your website could be a victim if you’re surrounded by many spammy, low-quality or harmful backlinks. Here’s an analogy of real-time. Consider backlinks as a group of buddies. You do not want to be associated with unshady people, do you? This is also true for your site.
Your website should only be associated with sites with the same values and interests and not some shady SEO site that is only looking to play the system. In a sense, harmful backlinks can be compared to the friends you want to stay clear of.
What are Toxic Links?
Toxic backlinks refer to untrustworthy or spammy links that could harm your website’s ranking on SERPs. SEOs adhere to this definition. However, there are many differences. Some might say it’s a fake link that’s put on a site solely to manipulate the rankings of a website. Some might say it’s an affiliate link from an untrustworthy or unauthentic website. No matter what, no way your website could gain by using them. This is the reason why many SEOs choose to eliminate these.
It is also not a good idea to create a Google perception that you’re attempting to cheat the system by purchasing links or participating in fraudulent link schemes.
Toxic backlinks can originate from many sources. Here are a few examples:
- Links from hacker websites
- Spam comments
- Forum spam
- Paid links
- Link farms that offer links
- PBNs (private blog networks)
Google clarifies that they don’t possess the concept of having “toxic” and “bad” links. All they take into consideration is whether the link is of good quality. Then, why are SEO experts love to use the term “toxic” hyperlinks? Famous Singapore SEOs, like Bruce Clay and Neil Patel, have been using this term for many years. It is used to describe the links that may harm your site’s ranking. These are links that are not natural and are placed to rig Google’s algorithm. They do not conform to Google’s values and provide the most user-friendly experience, which is why they are called toxic.
The Terms You Must Be Able to
Once we’ve answered the question “what are the harmful hyperlinks?” it’s time to take a step forward and address a different question:
- Toxic Links Toxic Links: Any link affecting your website’s rank on search engine results is considered toxic.
- Spammy Links: The hyperlinks are designed to increase your website’s rank on search results. These include links from link farms, Private blogs, blog networks (PBNs), pages in foreign languages, websites that post statistics about domains, and so on.
- Manipulative Links: These links are ones that Google’s algorithms consider unnatural or not given editorially. They’re also referred to for pay-per-clicks or link schemes and much more.
Google provides a list of items they think are manipulative.
“Bad” Links”Bad” Links: A “bad” URL is a link that is from a spammy or low-quality website. This includes large-scale advertising in articles or guest-posting campaigns using keyword-rich anchor text links, participation with link schemes, purchasing links, and over-expensive exchange of links. These sites are notorious for their unsatisfactory user experience and lack of new content, and so on.
Disavow Tool: This is a Google tool that allows you to provide the list of backlinks you want to be not considered. Links farms, PBNs, and other spammy sites are examples of “bad” links. If your website is negatively affected by harmful backlinks, it is possible to use the disavow tool to notify Google which websites they should not ignore.
