What are Google Penalties?
A Google penalty is a punishment imposed on a website by Google for breaking a rule or for not following their best practice guidelines. A website may be penalized for using black-hat SEO techniques or because of an updated ranking algorithm.
The worst thing that can happen to a business owner is for their website to get penalized by Google. This means that potential customers may not be able to find your website, which could lead to a decrease in traffic and revenue.
Google’s main priority is giving its users accurate and high-quality search results. If Google detects that a website is manipulating search results, that website may be penalized as a result. Even though penalties are a hassle for website owners, they prevent websites from trying to beat the algorithm, which in turn allows Google to provide the best possible search results.
Understanding the Types of Manual Action Google Penalties
Different types of Google penalties exist, the most common being algorithmic penalties. These are penalties that are applied to many websites at once due to a systematic update, like the Panda update. Sometimes manual action penalties are taken against an individual website because of an issue on that specific site.
If your website gets a manual action penalty, you will get a message in your Google Search Console. You can also check for manual action penalties yourself by clicking on the “Manual Actions” button on Google Search Console. Any messages on Google Search Console will describe the type of penalty that was placed on your website, and it may affect only certain pages or your entire site.
The Most Common Google Penalties and How to Fix Them
If you’re following best practices for SEO, you shouldn’t have to worry about penalties from Google. If you do get penalized, Google has a process for you to follow to fix the problem and have the penalty removed. The most common penalties are listed below, along with instructions on how to get rid of them.
1. Unnatural Link Penalties
In 2012, Google updated its algorithm to target link spam and unethical link building schemes. This update became known as the Penguin algorithm update.
Link volume was previously a larger factor in determining a web page’s ranking. This meant that some lower quality sites could engage in manipulative practices to get links from other low-quality sites, and they would still appear higher in search results than some of their more high-quality competitors.
Today, if you’re acting on a spammy link-building scheme, Google may hit you with one of two penalties for unnatural links:
- Unnatural links pointing to your website
- Unnatural outbound links that your website is hosting
2. Inbound and Outbound Links
If you have any low-quality, spammy, or toxic links pointing towards your site, you’ll want to remove them or get them disavowed. If you have a new site, the best way to get started with link building is to follow white-hat practices. This means getting links from high-quality websites and avoiding spammy websites. Once you have had your site for a while, it is a good idea to analyze your links and clean up any low-quality ones every few months. If you have any low-quality, spammy, or toxic links pointing towards your site, you will want to remove them.
You can find a list of your website’s backlinks using tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, or Search Console. These tools will also show you which backlinks are against Google’s Webmaster Guidelines so you can remove them.
If you come across a backlink that you want to remove, the best thing to do is to contact the website owner and request that they take it down. Most of the time, they’ll be happy to do so. However, if you can’t get in touch with the site owner or they refuse to remove the link, you can make a list of all the toxic backlinks, tell Google about them using the Disavow links tool, and then ask Google to ignore the backlink when ranking your site.
3. Hacked Site or Pure Spam Penalties
If your website is hacked, it may be penalized with a “hacked site” or “pure spam” penalty. This usually happens when a hacker injects malicious links or other spammy content onto a website. If Google finds this, it may put a notification in the search results saying “this site is hacked”, which can lower your ranking and visibility. Or, it may just label your site as “pure spam”.
To prevent your website from being hacked, install security features and keep a clean, recent backup of your website and its files.
The Fix
If your site is hacked, you should contact your web host, take your site offline to prevent any more damage, and change all of your passwords. You’ll want to look for things like:
- Spammy links, images, added pages, or content that has been added to your site
- Malware or phishing on your site
Before you start cleaning up the damage, you need to figure out how hackers got into your site in the first place so they don’t regain access and hurt your site all over again. There are many different ways in which your site could be vulnerable, including:
- Weak or reused passwords
- Viruses on your computer
- Outdated themes, software, or plugins
- Bad coding practices
- Open redirects
If your website has been hacked, you can fix the vulnerability and push the website back online. If Google has labeled your site as hacked, you will need to request a review from them to remove the hacked label.
4. AMP Content Mismatch
The content on an AMP web page is different from the content on the canonical version of that web page.
No two snowflakes are alike, they say. No two snowflakes are the same, it is said.
A user should be able to do everything on an AMP page that they can do on a regular page, and vice versa.
If a manual action has been taken on an AMP page, that page will no longer appear in Google Search, and the canonical version will be displayed instead.
The Fix
- Check to ensure the AMP page is associated with the correct canonical page.
- Verify the content of the AMP and canonical pages are generally the same. Edit as needed.
- Confirm that Google’s view of the page is the same as the user’s view. This can be accomplished by using the URL Inspection tool. This works for both the canonical and AMP versions of the page. It’s not uncommon for a mismatch to occur due to a robots.txt file blocking resources on one page or the other. This tool will expose that issue, among others.
- Once you get your AMP and canonical pages in sync, navigate to Google Search Console > Security & Manual Actions > Manual Actions and Request a Review.
- Keep an eye on your Search Console account. That’s where Google will inform you that a site review has occurred. Assuming your site no longer violates guidelines, the manual action will be revoked.
The best way to avoid getting penalized is to be proactive and check both the AMP and canonical versions of a page.
5. Unnatural Links to Your Site
As time progresses, Google is finding that the algorithm is more effective than manual action in terms of handling spammy links.
The reason that a manual action is always the same is because people are buying links and/or participating in link schemes to improve their organic SERPs. This is not allowed according to Google’s Webmaster Guidelines.
The Fix
- Download the links to your site from Google Search Console.
- Audit these links to identify any that may violate linking guidelines.
- Remove or add a rel=”nofollow” attribute to non-conforming links.
- Disavow any links that you are unable to get removed or no-followed.
- Submit a Reconsideration Request after you’ve cleaned up your link profile.
Here’s a tip for you: put effort into creating links the right way, and steer clear of link schemes.
6. Discover Policy Violation: Adult-Themed Content
Google explicitly prohibits adult-themed content from appearing in Discover.
This means that nudity, sexually explicit materials, and even sexually suggestive content are not allowed.
An exception to this rule are scientific or medical terms related to human or sex education.
The Fix
- Review and remove any content that even remotely appears to violate the Discover policy.
- After completing your review and making necessary edits, navigate to Google Search Console > Security & Manual Actions > Manual Actions and Request a Review. As with any reconsideration request, be upfront & honest – explain how the error occurred and what specific actions have been taken to prevent a repeat. Per Google, you will need to “provide evidence of changed editorial practices including new editorial guidelines and an editorial board with a history of improved practices.”
- Keep an eye on your Search Console account. That’s where Google will inform you that a site review has occurred. Assuming your site no longer violates guidelines, the manual action will be revoked.
If you want your content to appear in Google Discover, make sure that it is appropriate for all audiences.
7. News and Discover Policy Violation: Dangerous Content
Google does not allow any content that would directly cause serious and immediate harm to be published. This includes both people and animals.
This statement is too general and leaves me confused. YouTube does a better job of specifying what kind of content is considered dangerous.
The standards that are found at YouTube Help are most likely the same standards that are used for Google News and Discover.
Don’t publish:
- Extremely dangerous challenges that pose an imminent risk of physical injury.
- Dangerous or threatening pranks that lead victims to fear imminent serious physical danger, or that create serious emotional distress in minors.
- Instructions to kill or harm, showing viewers how to perform activities meant to kill or maim others. For example, giving instructions to build a bomb meant to injure or kill others.
- Hard drug use or creation; this is content that depicts abuse of or instructions on how to create hard drugs such as cocaine or opioids. Hard drugs are defined as drugs that can (mostly) lead to physical addiction.
- Eating disorders; content that praises glorifies, or encourages viewers to imitate anorexia or other eating disorders. Eating disorders are characterized by abnormal or disturbed eating habits which negatively affect a person’s health (including eating non-food items).
- Violent events promoting or glorifying violent tragedies, such as school shootings.
- Instructional theft or cheating such as showing viewers how to steal tangible goods or promoting dishonest behavior.
- Hacking. This means demonstrating how to use computers or information technology with the intent to steal credentials, compromise personal data, or cause serious harm to others such as (but not limited to) hacking into social media accounts.
- Bypassing payment for digital content or services. Showing viewers how to use apps, websites, or other information technology to gain unauthorized free access to audio content, audiovisual content, full video games, software, or streaming services that normally require payment.
- Promoting dangerous remedies or cures. Content that claims that harmful substances or treatments can have health benefits.
This is not a complete list.
The Fix
- Review and remove any dangerous content that even remotely appears to violate the News policy or Discover policy.
- After completing your review and making necessary edits, navigate to Google Search Console > Security & Manual Actions > Manual Actions and Request a Review. As with any reconsideration request, be upfront & honest – explain how the error occurred and what specific actions have been taken to prevent a repeat. Per Google, you will need to “provide evidence of changed editorial practices including new editorial guidelines and an editorial board with a history of improved practices.”
- Keep an eye on your Search Console account. That’s where Google will inform you that a site review has occurred. Assuming your site no longer violates guidelines, the manual action will be revoked.
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