Remove all sitewide links or keep the PR5 homepage link?

[Michael Fiske]

I'm a chiropractor and have had one sitewide link on a PR5 site for a couple of years. At first it seemed to really boost my site, but in the last year or so the site has plummetted to page 4 or 5. This is not a really big problem because I'm #1 in Yelp and also in the 7 box, with 5 stars and more reviews than any competitor.

But I know that sitewide links are frowned on by Google and I'm pretty sure that my site is getting penalized for them, even though there are no problems in Webmaster.

Majestic shows 30,263 backlinks (!) to my site (www.whiteoakchiropractic.com), a trust flow of 27 and a citation flow of 36. That seems like it should be pretty good for a hometown local chiropractor, but yet my site is buried.

So what to do? Remove all of the sitewide links altogether? Or keep the link, but only on the PR5 homepage?

Thanks for your help!

 

[Linda Buquet]

Hi Michael,

Sorry I missed this thread. I helped you alot in your other thread and noted that you appear to have an organic penalty and asked at the end about backlinks.

But in this thread, can't really help too much because I don't deal with backlinks.

But I'd check your anchor text in those backlinks as that may be the prob.

Considering your contact us page ranks higher than home, but is still only on page 5 I would guess you have too many City+KW anchors going to home.

 

[Greg Schueler]

I would agree too that there are probably a lot of keyword rich anchor text going to your home page. Also the sitewide links do really hurt.

You could keep one link on that main pr5 page and remove the rest, or keep them sitewide, if you get traffic from them, and make then no-follow links. (no-follow links still help in their own special way).

 

[Blake Denman]

Here's a couple screen shots from ahrefs. More than 8k do follow links from the same domain with the same keyword rich anchor text. I didn't dive too deep in the analysis but it's safe to assume that you have a penalty on your hands.

 

[EdwardOhio]

Does the "recent posts" widget create a sitewide link problem? I have 10 recent posts listed on front page of many of my websites. And it does appear on every page.

The reason us that I want viewers to be able to see other article topics when they click on a specific article.

Thanks.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Michael,

I just ran a backlink anchor analysis for you at Anchor Text Over Optimization Tool and Anchor Text Diversity Report by Remove'em

I don't specialize in backlink analysis but looks like a problem. Here is screenshot.

 

[Linda Buquet]

Hi Edward, we are helping Michael in this thread so your Q will get buried in between posts to him.

If you can start a new thread that will be awesome.

Michael I'm moving all your posts to help which is where threads about help on a specific listing should be posted.

Thanks, Linda

 

[Michael Fiske]

OK, that's what I thought. I'll ask to have the sitewide links removed and keep the PR5 homepage link and see what that does.

I appreciate everyone's help.

 

[Jamie Steigerwald]

I would follow Greg's suggestion and make them no-follow links. There is no reason to lose the exposure if you can make them no-follow.

 

[Nevyana]

Hi Michael,
I just wanted to focus your attention on the fact that the website weallwantsomeone DOT org [live link removed by Linda] actually brings 30,359 out of 30,423 backlinks to your site. It is a PR5 site and probably it is the one you are referring to – and yes I would most probably refrain from disavowing all your links from that domain, even if it brings some problematic exact match anchor text. All in all your anchor text profile is good – you have focused on using your website address as anchor text or your name – which is the preferred approach. You should definitely refrain from using exact match anchor text like Vacaville chiropractor (which currently represents 20% f your anchor text profile). It is nice thing to consult Majestic when checking up your backlink profile. In their analysis you could see that the remaining domains that link to your website are pretty good actually (again pay attention to Trust/Citation ratio – the trust ratio should total to at least half of the citation flow).

My advice will be to try to make your website mentioned in local websites instead of using location stuffed anchor text for your backinks. Being mentioned in local sites will definitely give Google the right signal for positioning your business in the local searches (even if for the local results you rank at the first page in the organic searches your website is far behind on page 6. Good luck!