Toxic backlinks are considered the uninvited guests in the world of search engine optimization. These bad links are from low-quality, spam, or malicious sources. Backlinks are viewed as one of the positive ranking factors by search engines like Google. However, toxic backlinks can have opposite effects on your website, possibly harming your online reputation.
This article will provide you with all the necessary knowledge like what are toxic backlinks, the 9 causes of them, and how to find and remove these harmful links. After reading and learning all of the information in this informative article, you can maintain a good backlink profile for your website.
What Are Toxic Backlinks?
Toxic backlinks, also called harmful or bad backlinks, are inbound links that may hurt the visibility of your website within SERP. In most cases, toxic links violate the link spam policies of Google since they are created mainly for SEO purposes rather than adding value to the users.
Google evaluates your backlinks to gauge the credibility and authority of your site. While certain backlinks can positively impact your SEO, those gained through manipulative practices may be flagged.
Google combats unethical link-building tactics with strict guidelines and systems that often ignore or devalue questionable backlinks. However, if your site accumulates a significant number of toxic backlinks, it may lead to a manual action or penalty by Google.
9 Causes Of Toxic Backlinks
Here are nine common practices that can lead to toxic backlinks:
1. Purchasing Backlinks
Exchanging cash, products, or services for links will generate poisonous backlinks unless the links are qualified as “nofollow” or “sponsored.” This qualification signals to Google that the link should not pass SEO value. For instance, digital advertisements, product reviews, influencer collaborations, and paid directory listings should always use appropriate attributes like rel=”nofollow” or rel=”sponsored” to comply with guidelines.
2. Participating In Link Exchanges
An overly used mutual link exchange, wherein two sites make a deal to link to other sites solely for search engine optimization reasons, can raise red flags at Google. Yes, the occasional reciprocal links do occur naturally but lots of them can seem manipulative. Remove these kinds of links if they are against the guidelines of Google.
3. Involvement With Private Blog Networks (PBNs)
PBNs are groups of websites devised to create backlinks to the target website. Since these links usually lack authenticity, Google algorithms are very effective at detecting and punishing such links. It is better to stay away from PBNs and remove all toxic links related to them. If you want you publicize your link on someone’s blog, you are expected to do blogger outreach for collaborations.
4. Utilizing Automated Link-Building Tools
Automated tools that create backlinks in blog comments, forums, or free directories often result in spammy websites and toxic domains. You need to avoid services that promise quick and large-scale backlinks, as these practices can harm your site’s SEO.
5. Publishing Links In Unnatural Contexts On Other Websites
Irrelevant or forced backlinks in forums, comment sections, or social media posts can harm your brand and result in toxic links. Therefore, you should link backlinks that are relevant to the context or content. Links in user-generated content should use the rel=”ugc” attribute to ensure that your links are compliant with Google’s guidelines.
6. Adding Your Business To Poor-Quality Online Directories
Submitting your business to directories with poor editorial standards or broad, low-value content can result in harmful backlinks. Be cautious, especially if directories charge for listings while emphasizing backlinks, as some may negatively affect your SEO.
7. Embedding Links In Widgets
If you create widgets that link back to your site, make sure the links are marked as “nofollow”. This is because users embedding the widget can’t control the link’s placement or anchor text and could be seen as unqualified links by Google.
8. Requiring Backlinks Via Contractual Agreements
Demanding links via contract or terms of service that don’t allow third-party owners to nofollow links is link spam. If your business has engaged in this behavior, ask clients or partners to remove or update such links and change your contracts to remove this requirement.
9. Falling Prey To Negative SEO Campaigns
Competitors may try to harm your rankings by building spammy links to your site in hopes of your site receiving a penalty. However, Google’s algorithms often just ignore these types of links, and they generally won’t hurt your site’s SEO performance.
How To Find And Remove Toxic Backlinks
While Google often disregards occasional low-quality links, it’s important to check for toxic backlinks if you’re concerned about previous link-building practices or if your site has received a manual action for unnatural links.
Check for Manual Actions in Google Search Console
To determine if Google has flagged your site, log into Google Search Console and navigate to:
Security & Manual Actions > Manual Actions.
If the message “No issues detected” appears, you should still consider conducting a toxic backlink audit to prevent future penalties. However, if a manual action is listed, it’s crucial to identify and address harmful backlinks promptly to help your site recover.
Option 1: Use a Toxic Backlink Checker
The simplest way to locate bad backlinks is by using a specialized tool like Semrush’s Backlink Audit.
Step 1: Enter your domain and select Start Backlink Audit.
Step 2: Configure your audit as instructed.
Step 3: Once completed, review the Overview report.
To enhance accuracy, you can connect accounts like Google Analytics, Google Search Console, or Majestic through the Integrations menu.
In the Audit report, backlinks that were flagged for review will be given a Toxicity Score (TS) from 0-100. The higher the score, the more likely to be harmful.
- Click the Toxicity Score to see flagged markers, categorized as Dangerous or Potentially Dangerous.
- Check the anchor text in the Anchor column. Toxic backlinks often include Money anchor text (Anchors matching target keywords, such as best running shoes.) and Compound anchor text (Mixes brand names with keywords, for example, Amazon running shoes.)
- Refer to the AS column, which shows the authority of referring domains; higher scores mean lower toxicity.
For every backlink:
- If it is not poisonous, click the Move to Whitelist icon.
- If it is poisonous, click the Move to Remove List icon.
Rerun the audit every month for new toxic backlinks that may pop up.
Option 2: Manually Identify Toxic Backlinks
Without access to a backlink checker, you’ll need to manually review your backlinks:
- Open Google Search Console and go to Links in the sidebar.
- Under Top linking sites, click More and export the list of referring sites.
Load the file into a spreadsheet and analyze the links. Focus on domains with high linking frequency or recent additions to streamline the process.
Useful Tips
Google Search Console provides limited backlink data, so manually identifying toxic links may take significant time. Using an automated tool can significantly simplify this process.
Removing Toxic Backlinks
Once you’ve found a toxic backlink worth taking action on, contact the referring domain and ask them to remove the link or add the appropriate “rel” attribute (e.g., rel=”nofollow”). If they refuse, you may have to disavow the link. Want safer, authority-driven links? Check out our Guest Posting solutions.
