Getting Google Penalty is the worst nightmare of every webmaster. After all, it can send years of hard work down the drain. Now it only affects your website traffic but it also affects the ranking of your website in SERPs.

It can be frustrating to face such a situation. If you are facing Google Penalty, know that not all hope is lost. Google Penalty recovery is difficult, but if you know your way, you can get your rankings back.

In this post, we'll look at different ways you can use Google Penalty recovery and help your site recover from any penalties. Before we get into the details, let's first look at the basics.

What is Google Penalty?

Google Penalty is like a penalty given to a website. Google provides to websites that may have challenged marketing guidelines or practices enforced by Google.

Sometimes, a penalty may also be given after updating their ranking algorithm. Or it could also be launched after a manual review in which Google suspects that a website may be using a black hat SEO strategy.

If you're new to SEO, it's easy to mistake an algorithm update for Google's penalty. Algorithms rely primarily on a set of calculations and rules to ensure they yield the desired results.

Typically, these algorithms are designed to reward websites that conform to their quality standards. Webmaster guidelines Google identifies criteria to meet these standards.

In addition, Google also employs human reviewers, who manually review websites and evaluate them. They primarily test websites that may have adopted algorithms but don't really meet quality standards.

Even if you are on the wrong side of the update, you may feel like you've been punished. In both cases, the end result is almost the same - you lose a lot of organic traffic.

What do you get a Google penalty for?

In this section, we take a look at some common penalties for hacking websites. Of course, there are other penalties as well. But here we only look at the common.

Unnatural links: Google considers backlinks to be a measure of the quality of the site and its content. If Google suspects that a link looks like being paid or like it's part of a link diagram, you're in trouble.

Examples of unnatural links include:

Low quality links, hidden or keyword rich are embedded in the gadget of the site.
Links in templates or footers of different websites
Optimized links are included in comments or forum signatures
Text ads can pass PageRank

In such cases, Google may not count the link value at all and they may even hit you with a penalty. Mostly, this penalty will be imposed on certain pages if the problem is localized. Only sometimes, they give a penalty throughout the site.

Low quality or Duplicate content: Google wants to give their users the best experience. If your content doesn't give them any value, you can expect a Google penalty.

Low quality or duplicate content includes:

Content is automatically generated
Lane page
Content is excluded
Guest posts are of low quality
Thin content page (thin content)

This penalty can have a significant impact on your search traffic. For this penalty, Google displays a manual action with the following message, Thin Thin content with little or no added value.

In some cases, it may be unavoidable or even necessary to use duplicate content. For example, if you are writing an article that includes quotes or lyrics of a song, you will have duplicate content.

To show Google that you acknowledge the duplication and are acting in good faith, you can use canonical tags. This can divert their attention to a piece of content.

Spam: Although rarely penalized for spam, it has happened. Spam can include everything from excessive concealment to scraping content. You are not likely to be penalized, especially for spam, unless you create a spam site.

One more thing you need to be careful about is Freehosts Freehosts. Usually, spammers use cheap or free web hosting. If a server is known to host major spam sites, Google may choose to penalize all websites linked to that web server. So be careful while choosing a web host for your site. A wrong choice will probably hurt the development of your website in the future.

These are all manual actions performed. Algorithm penalties are based on two Google algorithm updates: Panda and Penguin. Let's see what they are before we begin the recovery process.

Panda Penalty: Penalty This is to check the quality of the content a website is publishing. The surprising thing about this penalty is that it affects your entire site even if you may have trouble just on one part of the site.

Although the patent for Panda is quite technical and bland, it clarifies how it works. What it says is that Google has created a modifying element throughout the site. When it first appeared, Panda affected the content farm the most. It is because of what algorithm updates are targeted.

It is based on quality factors and aims to eliminate duplicate, shallow links, brand search and poorly written content. When a particular site does not meet the criteria, Google will apply the revision point to the entire site. So even if you have a few low quality pages, it can still affect your site.

Penguin Penalty: Penalty This is mainly about backlinks. Unlike Panda algorithm updates, Penguin only affects specific pages. So if you are affected by this Google penalty, your reinstatement may only be required for certain sites. All your other pages will still have a chance to rank.

Here are some factors related to backlinks that can get you in trouble and penalize your site:

Diverse links : If most of your backlinks come from your comments section, that's considered unnatural. Similarly, if many links have the same anchor text, that's also a bad sign. Google understands that you are trying to manipulate search results.
Link quality : Usually, most websites have some low quality and high quality backlinks. If you have a low number of quality links, you'll catch Google 's attention. On the contrary, even if you have a high number of high quality links in your profile, it is highly suspicious.
Bonding velocity : If a website gains a lot of links in a short period of time, that is considered unnatural.

Google Recovery Recovery: Search for problems

The first step for Google to recover your penalty is to find out the cause of your Google penalty. Only then can you move with the recovery process. You need to determine whether the cause is manual penalties or when the algorithm activation occurs.

You may notice that your traffic drops suddenly. In such a case, you first need to find out the reason for the traffic loss. For each cause, there is a different Google penalty recovery method.

There are mainly two types of Google penalties that can be applied to your site: Manual action and algorithmic Penalty. Let's see what is the recovery process for them.

Guide to action

To check if you are manually affected, you need to visit Google Webmaster Tools. Go there and check your notifications. If Google has taken manual action on your site, you will be clearly informed about it. They will also mention the reason for the punishment. Based on that, you can work in the recovery process.

Algorithmic penalty

Finding manual actions is easy. It is a simple process. When it comes to algorithmic penalties, it's not the same.

You do not receive notifications from Google, so you need to search for yourself. For this, look at the total amount of time you see your traffic drop.

Know that each update comes with its own set of changes. While Panda focuses on content quality, Penguin focuses on distributing anchor text and backlinks.

Google Penalty Recovery: Identify and delete bad backlinks

Another common reason you can be penalized for Google is bad backlinks. There are many different types of bad backlinks.

Not sure if you have bad backlinks? Check this list to make sure you're not in the gray area.

Bad backlinks may come from:

The site has duplicate content
Website not related to your website niche
Sneaky redirects
Link cloaking
Backlinks throughout the site
Backlinks to your site from directories
Advertising and sponsored content
Backlinks from many gambling sites and adults
Backlinks are added via auto-approved comments
Backlinks with hidden text

These are different types of bad backlinks that you can search on your site. If you find them, you need to delete them before you are penalized Google.

If you have been penalized, this is what you need to do to recover. Whether it's an algorithmic penalty or a manual action, it's important for you to analyze your backlinks. That is the first step for Google to recover the penalty.

For this, you can use backlink analysis tools like Moz Link Explorer, Majestic and others. When you perform an analysis of your backlinks, you can find out which links are likely to cause a drop in your rankings.

Alternatively, you can access Google Webmaster Tools. From there, you can download all backlinks to your site. You will find the option in: Search traffic → Links to your site → Who links the most → Other → Download the latest links.

To find bad backlinks, see the list of dofollow backlinks. They are links that have passed PageRank. To identify bad backlinks from it, you can use the backlink analysis tools we mentioned above.

Finding bad backlinks is only half the work done. There is a lot to make to recover the punishment. To identify bad backlinks, you will have to check each link manually. Remember to check the links in your blog comment twice. To find more bad backlinks, you can check if the links show Pagerank equal.

To make it easier, simply select Filter Filters and click PageRank Page. You will see a drop down menu where you can choose Crane 0, the domain name option.

It is a good idea to manually check each link that appears with this method. You should also check out websites based on their domain name extensions.

Remove bad backlinks

If you find links that may hurt your rankings, it's time to remove them. To recover the penalty - and to improve your Google rankings, you will need to write an email. Address it to the webmaster of the specific site that has the bad link you want to delete.

While writing an email, make sure you send it from your company email address (compared to your personal address). Remember to keep the tone of your email professional and polite. Make sure you list all the links you want to remove. You want to make it easy for webmasters to remove bad links. Do not spam the webmaster during your recovery process but send follow-up emails if necessary. That is all that is needed from your end.

Some webmasters may remove their links while others may not be required. In some cases, webmasters may even ask for some money to remove links.

If a webmaster ignores your email or requests money, you will need to reject the entire domain of that particular site.

Reject an entire domain name

To recover the penalty, rejecting a domain name is sometimes the only remaining option. To do this, you can access the screen backlinks. For each backlink, you will see an install button in the row. Click it and add a tag to all selected links. You can choose a card as a refusal.

By filtering this list, you can get the full list of tagged links. Next, you can export it and bring it there Disavow Link Tool . It may take about 2-4 weeks to process your report. Once it has been processed, you should be able to see a change in your site's rankings.

Images via the Disavow Links Tool

Google Penalty Recovery: Fix penguin penalty error

If you get punished with Penguin penalties, you really can't do much. But that doesn't mean you should give up immediately. The first step is to remove unwanted links. They may be bad links or unnatural. Use the steps mentioned earlier to remove them.

Also, you should check your anchor text distribution. This is to check where you are getting the link. The easiest way to do this is to use the Ahrefs Backlink Checker. It's free to use and can give you a detailed report in seconds.

Image via Ahrefs

In your report, go to the Relationship Overview tab. Here you will see the anchor text distribution for your website. A healthy report will show naked URLs, brand name keywords, targeted keyword variations, and more.

If you only see the right keywords in the report, that's the issue you are interested in. It means your site is vulnerable to Penguin penalties. You need to remove the given keywords.

From Wikipedia's Backlinks tab, you'll be able to identify the exact source of anchor text. Based on that, you can also find referring domain names associated with it. As with backlinks, you will have to write an email to the webmaster. If they don't delete the links, then you can also use the Disavow Link Tool.

Google Penalty Recovery: Fix Panda penalty error

Panda penalties primarily focus on sites that display a lot of ads and sites that have slow site speeds, poor content, or poor navigation. In short, it includes everything you need to consider in order to provide users with a good user experience.

The first step to recovering penalties is to check your site speed. You can use a tool like Pingdom for this purpose. It will show you how long your website loads.

Next, you need to find low quality or duplicate sites. To check this, visit Google Webmaster Tools and search the Search interface and HTML improvements. These sections will show you how many copies you have on your site.

When you find these pages, you have two options to restore. You cannot follow them or delete them completely. If you can do that, you've completed the penalty recovery process for your site.

Plus: What happens if someone steals your content?

People sometimes search for "duplicate content" when their content has been republished on another site without permission. It makes sense to call this duplicate content, but you'll find that the proposed solutions are out of your control because they depend on other site owners.

Fortunately, this is the worst nuisance. Google acknowledges that there is an "edge case" in which duplicate content may exceed the original content for some very long, extremely low value searches. They maintain that the original site should rank higher on legitimate keyword phrases.

Although it is not likely to be Google Penalty, we have included it here because people want to fight a similar situation on their own.

Recently, a writer named Anna explained that the content she wrote and published on her own site was reposted without permission on another site. They have overcome it as their own. Initially, there is no agency that you can easily appeal *. To get "stolen" or republished content, you need to contact the site owner.

Try "contact us" on the page. If that doesn't work:
Search for a domain name in the database WhoIs . At least one abusive email is required to contact.
Send a professional email listing the link of the article. Do not threaten. Do not allow your stimulation to seep in. Ask them to delete the post.
If they refuse to remove content, you can ask them to use rel = canonical tag on their site to name your content as original content.
* And finally, if they refuse to cooperate, you can consider the action through DMCA .

Conclusion

No webmaster wants to face a Google penalty. But if, for some reason, you are punished with a penalty, there is hope to recover. The recovery process is tedious, but it can help you improve your site's reputation and search engine rankings.

In order for Google to recover the penalty, you need to remove bad backlinks and remove your duplicate content. Also, you need to make sure that you are not uploading any low quality content and doing a good anchor text distribution.