Competition is using Black Hat and has spammy backlink profile. What to do?

You have only listed the negatives as far as the links your competitors have. Times have changed. Penguin no longer penalizes websites for bad links (although it is possible they could receive a manual penalty). Google simply ignores them. You did not point out how many solid links each site has, which is what really matters. 10 outstanding links may be all it takes, regardless of the thousand bad ones.

You have fallen into the trap of thinking that Google cares about quality content.


I once ranked a blank page (well, blank except for the keyword in the title).


Ranking in competitive areas is based on backlinks.


What MOZ says, ain't relevant. What Google says is.


Google, based on what you describe, says good backlinks count, lousy ones are not relevant.


You only pointed out the bad backlinks your competitors have. You did not point any good ones. And one really good one can get you to outrank most, sometimes all (depending what they've done).


Think of it like this
brand new link =$1
1 link on a page that's got links from 5 new one = $25.
1 link from 5 pages that have links from pages that =$25 have a value of $125.
And so on.


Get yourself some good backlinks. I know, seems unfair, seeing your content actually helps the searcher more than theirs. But Google, like life, ain't about fair.

Hello, I would say find out from which authoritative websites your competitors are getting backlinks. Because, these are the backlinks Google count and because of those backlinks they are ranking on the top of Google. You should also try to get backlinks from those Authoritative websites or more authoritative websites then and then only you can beat your competitors.

This is why your site is failing to rank highly. Quality, Dofollow Backlinks are necessary in order to rank sites, especially in competitive niches. So, instead of focusing on your competitor, you should be trying to build backlinks on sites that have a high DA (domain authority), contextual (within content that is related to your keywords) and Dofollow.

I think anyone that understands SEO will understand what i am about to say.. and there will be those that may disagree... but letting an amount of time play out I am more than confident my Idea will play out to be "true"

301 re-directs used to pass juice but only a percentage... they ( Google ) have come out and said this is no longer the case. So sites have been injecting 301 redirects towards their sites, creating a boost.

So the question then needs to be answered - Why would Google do this? The answer here is pretty clear, and it stems from the necessity of switching to HTTPS:. People / Companies were having to convert from HTTP to HTTPS and the only way to really do this is with the use of 301 re-directs.

Googles previous stance was to minimize the effect of a 301 - but now they are caught with the necessity of a 301 to come into compliance with the HTTPS requirement. so they have allowed 301's to carry across the weight. This was needed not to penalize those doing the right thing... but obviously leaves a wide open hole for those that for lack of a better term - not doing the right thing.

SO as I have explained this, there is a clear and defined issue. There is a clear and defined reason for creating the issue. And without a blink of an eye I am sure there will be a clear and defined resolution to the issue.

THIS is setting itself up to being one of the most disruptive updates to ever occur on Google. THIS is why I would suggest staying as far away from 301 re-directs as possible, unless you absolutely have to. I predict that the "correction" will fall into 301's from HTTP to HTTPS on the same domain will be allowed at full strength, 301's from HTTPS to HTTPS on the same domain will be allowed at partial strength, and 301's from one domain to the next will be a 0 or possibly a negative.

If you do a quick search on Google for "what percentage of sites use HTTPS?" you will see the numbers fall in the 51 to 59% category. I bring this up, because this is going to be the "Magic" number that brings the 301 update into play. Google historically is looking for a 60% saturation, adoption, or market share to determine an amount of success. I am suggesting that somewhere in the 60 to 80% range Google will put its foot down.

I am guessing it will be closer to sooner than later. I say this because of all the newly popped up schemes of manipulating 301's is right now at an all time high - and search results are literally being gamed - and if I know it, Google obviously knows it.

So in the end it becomes a bit of a waiting game... one that i don't think will be a long wait in this case. Because we are discussing an issue that had a check stop in place before, but for obvious reasons had to be removed.

Hope that Helps!

if you're able to find out spam links then google surely knows about the spam and these must have been effectively ignored by big g. my advice foucs on your links.

Thanks for starting this thread. I find the tips and discussion very helpful.
In this case, can gray hat work? It does both of quality content and backlinking,to say the least.

Rat out your competition if you want, but this won't make your position any better. Over time, someone else will outrank you.


No active off-page SEO passes Google's guidelines, but you cannot expect to rank without link building either.



Apart from content, there is technical SEO and coding aspect as well. Rich snippets, etc too.


If you are lagging behind, you need to improve your content, your site structure and usability, etc. There are way to many things that influence website ranking.


You have been questioning your competitor, but ignoring your own link profile. Let's look at it as well. If all your links are natural, what kind of sites link to you? Why do you have 3000 links from 300 sites? In general course, your site should have got 1 or 2 link from each site. Analyze your links.


Best of luck.