Google Webmaster Tools Disavow Backlinks is Dangerous
DISCLAIMER: I am not responsible for any damage you do with this tool. You use Google’s tool at your own risk.
Finding a Link to Google Webmaster Tools Disavow is Annoying
So here is the link to the Google Webmaster Tools backlink disavow: Google Webmaster Tools Disavow. You’ll need Google Webmaster Tools access for the domain you’re working on. I put a nice target=”_blank” on that link because you’re going to come back here in a few seconds when you realize they’ve given you the keys to the nuke and no instruction manual.
Seriously, Be Careful With The Disavow Tool
Using the Google disavow backlinks tool is dangerous, if you’re not sure what you’re doing you can destroy your site. Google makes that pretty clear. You’ll be permanently telling Google to ignore certain backlinks to your site. It cannot be undone. Backlinks make the juice flow so you better be damn sure you’re ready to nuke them or you’ll likely drop in the SERPs. Like anything dangerous this isn’t a toy so don’t play around with it.
You Use a .txt File to Disavow, But Google Doesn’t Tell You The Format
If you don’t know how to create a flat .txt file in your life this isn’t the article for you. You need to find someone to help you. The format is simple, each resource you wish to disavow is separated by newlines (\n). You can have fully qualified URLs, (protocol, subdomain, domain, page, query strings) or you can disavow entire domains using the “domain:” prefix. Disavow by URL is very limited, but Disavow by Domain… now you’re playing with fire.
Disavow URL vs. Disavow Domain
Disavow URL
There’s a big difference in these two and Disavow URL mostly sux. When you disavow a URL you are disavowing something very, very specific. It is a URL in Google’s system, which means that it is the unique combination of protocol, domain, subdomain, directories, page, and query string. What does that mean in English? It means that if you are using URLs to disavow backlinks you have to list every… single… variation. Here’s a sample of just a few possible variations for just the homepage for an example domain:
- http://www.baddomain.com/
- http://www.baddomain.com
- http://www.baddomain.com/index.html
- http://www.baddomain.com/index.htm
- http://baddomain.com/index.html
- https://www.baddomain.com/index.html
- http://www.baddomain.com/badpage.html?bad=1
That’s way too much work. You’d need to do that for pretty much every possible page for every backlink and even Google doesn’t give you a totally complete dump of all your backlinks. Not to mention there are infinite possibilities so its not ever going to work if you are getting backlink spammed.
Disavow Domain
Disavowing a URL is pretty weak. Its so targeted you really aren’t getting much done. That’s the reason disavow by URL is the default, so people don’t shoot themselves in the foot and accidentally ruin their website. But if you just take the root domain, (not www.baddomain.com but baddomain.com) and apply the prefix of domain: then you can get rid of an entire shitty domain and whatever URLs they are backlinking to you on. This is why you need to be careful. Maybe you’re not sure what a domain really is but it was giving you juice or deep links, but you just disavowed all backlinks from that domain. You have just permanently removed that site from EVER being able to give you juice. However, this is amazing for when people black hat you because you can nuke whole domains at time. Ex:
domain:baddomain.com
You Need More Disavow .txt File Samples
You are a needy person, I just covered this. Here is a lame sample because if you need this you probably shouldn’t be messing with it.
domain:baddomain.com
domain:otherbaddomain.com
http://mehdomain.com/onlybacklink.html
You Have Work Left
Just because you’ve disavowed backlinks on Google doesn’t mean Google has disavowed those backlinks. You still need to have the actual links removed to be fully clear of their spam juice. That’s nearly impossible in most cases, but if you think its doable then do it because Google specifically says you need to do that. Now you know how to format your text file for Google Webmaster Tool Disavow Backlinks. Good luck… O_O