Oct 26 2011

SEO Penalty by Google – BLOOP

Some SEO experts believe that building too many links within a short span of time and which is based on a similar anchor text can caused the website to be red flagged by Google since it may give the impression that the those links have been acquired abnormally by using automated scripts or link building software.

This may result in the Google BLOOP or the “Backlink Over Optimization Penalty”. It is caused by the some inexperienced and so called expert over optimizing the website.  The over optimization may result in Google penalizing the website and its rankings as it frowns on such illegal activities.

Some of these activities which may cause a red flag include:

  1. Building too many links in a very short time which may be categorized as excessive link building by Google. Google frowns on artificially pushing the website rankings and aggressive link campaign may cause more harm than good. Let’s say a site has been getting 10 to 15 links in a day and all of a sudden it rises to 1000 links. This will look unnatural and is not recommended.
  2. If you are using similar anchor text in all of the links, then it may cause a penalty as well. This gives the impression of spam and is not recommended.
  3. If you are using the same IP or related IP addresses for the SEO campaign, then Google will catch it and penalize the site.

Google likes natural SEO and some of the penalties that may arise due to BLOOP are:

  1. The 30 penalty – This affects the whole domain
  2. The 950 penalty – This affects only some URLS and only some particular keywords.
  3. Index Exclusion or Complete ban – If the website has violated the quality guidelines and is using black hat techniques’ in the campaign, then a complete ban may be enforced by Google. Google stops indexing the website and it is excluded from  the search engine result pages

How Do You Avoid the Penalties?

You should take care of these things to avoid the penalties:

  1. Try building links naturally without any blips. Content and natural linking is the key.
  2. Avoid keyword stuffing in the page title, description, alt tags and in the page content.
  3. Don’t use links farms and shady linking practices.
  4. Never use cloaking and doorway pages.

The key focus for your website should be the user and not the search engine and the strategy should be geared towards that goal.

About the Author: Catherine Jones writes for http://www.markkia.com/.She enjoys content and writing about the social sphere.

8 Responses to “SEO Penalty by Google – BLOOP”

  1. Michael Rurup Andersen says:
    October 26, 2011 at 2:56 pm

    It’s definitely an interesting theory. Saw it first mentioned at search engine round table in a post which described it (from WebmasterWorld). I find it hard to believe that Google attually uses this, there would be to many ‘what ifs’, hence some content can go viral in a very short time – hence building extremly many links. Well i’m not saying i’m not rights, that’s the thing about believe it’s not always right. Feel free to convince me.

    The four point you mention in the last paragraph are good general guidelines and should always be used.

    Thanks for sharing, I look forward to see what others have to say about the matter?

    With regards
    Michael

  2. Wasim Ismail says:
    October 27, 2011 at 9:34 am

    Ensuring that your footprints on the web are clean, also ensure that that your site has not been attacked and effected. As sometimes hacks use a technique to send a lot of spam links to your site, which than causes your site to come out of search indexes due to penalty. Once you have cleaned your site you have to go through the process of reconsideration, which can be quite time consuming.
    Keep a good eye out for these attacks, and protect your site.

  3. FD Thomson says:
    October 27, 2011 at 12:17 pm

    It is really very useful information to an SEO professional. I think it is good approach by Google to prevent the spam and unnatural links.

  4. Seven Hills Luxury Real Estate says:
    October 28, 2011 at 7:19 am

    Wonderful post. Some bloggers may result to desperate measures once they see that their sites are not doing so well. Some even buy back links and hence the abnormal change from just a few to thousands. If the site is new then people should be patient instead of going for quick tricks which will only harm the blog.

  5. Henry Louis says:
    October 29, 2011 at 2:18 pm

    The way that you have explained about SEO Penalty by Google is very impressive. I hope it is more helpful in preventing the spam and getting natural links.

  6. digital paintings says:
    October 30, 2011 at 1:28 pm

    how do hide you IP adress not to get the Google penalty ?

  7. Window Lettering says:
    November 2, 2011 at 8:51 pm

    So what’s stopping me from building thousands of links to my competitors sites to give them the BLOOP?

  8. leathergoods says:
    November 14, 2011 at 11:11 am

    how to hide same ip address?